What do you think?
Rate this book
Tony and Pat Pratt #2
Murder Without Reservation
On location with the cast and crew of Japan's number one prime-time show, former ad exec Tony Pratt gets in over his head when someone shoots a horse and a drug dealer and he must save a boy from a white-water death. Reprint.
- GenresMystery
250 pages, Paperback
First published March 27, 1991
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
February 9, 2022
This was probably the worst book I have read in a long time, because any others worse than this, I abandoned. I picked this up for a lighter read after finishing Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee. I had high hopes, despite the dorky cover. After all, it was set in Central Oregon, which is my home state, it featured a husband and wife sleuthing team, and it had a Japanese film crew shooting footage for a popular TV show in their home country.
What I got was a travelogue of Central Oregon, with such minute details, I wondered whether we were ever going to get from one location to another. The wife, whose name was a totally annoying rhyme of Pat Pratt, was only brought from Portland in order to have sex offscreen with her husband. She was no help in the sleuthing department. I know this book was written in the 1990s, but this woman was so wimpy, all she did was moon around after her husband, suggest he wear a hat, and act as a foil for his wet underwear while he was "squirming around" while driving. Why he didn't just take off the underwear or his pants and let something dry out as well as his shirt (and his socks, which remained inside his wet tennis shoes) told me the author had never gotten wet while hiking, camping, fishing or boating. It was 100 degrees in the shade, but he couldn't dry his own clothes?
Every little movement of an arm, leg, head or hand had to be explained in minute detail, part by moving part. The wife instantly bonded with the young girl involved, because she was a woman. The bad guys should have worn black hats. They were so obvious, why not just complete their Western outfits with that old timey device so we could make sure we didn't miss them? All those who were not either in law enforcement or injured and lying in the hospital were under suspicion, but we all knew none of the film crew could be responsible for any of the crimes, because they were already wearing discriminatory and cringeworthy racial slurs as virtual uniforms, given to them by the entire community, still recovering, apparently, from the memories of WWII and Pearl Harbor.
I read the entire book because I couldn't believe Worldwide would think enough of this writer to give a 3 book contract to a series that took a writer and his wife into one apparently dangerous situation after another. The ending had two climaxes, both so badly written and executed (the Pratts should have gone over a cliff and saved any readers from being subjected to Book 3) that one of the overly-written and detailed parts had me exclaiming "You have to be kidding!" aloud.
What I got was a travelogue of Central Oregon, with such minute details, I wondered whether we were ever going to get from one location to another. The wife, whose name was a totally annoying rhyme of Pat Pratt, was only brought from Portland in order to have sex offscreen with her husband. She was no help in the sleuthing department. I know this book was written in the 1990s, but this woman was so wimpy, all she did was moon around after her husband, suggest he wear a hat, and act as a foil for his wet underwear while he was "squirming around" while driving. Why he didn't just take off the underwear or his pants and let something dry out as well as his shirt (and his socks, which remained inside his wet tennis shoes) told me the author had never gotten wet while hiking, camping, fishing or boating. It was 100 degrees in the shade, but he couldn't dry his own clothes?
Every little movement of an arm, leg, head or hand had to be explained in minute detail, part by moving part. The wife instantly bonded with the young girl involved, because she was a woman. The bad guys should have worn black hats. They were so obvious, why not just complete their Western outfits with that old timey device so we could make sure we didn't miss them? All those who were not either in law enforcement or injured and lying in the hospital were under suspicion, but we all knew none of the film crew could be responsible for any of the crimes, because they were already wearing discriminatory and cringeworthy racial slurs as virtual uniforms, given to them by the entire community, still recovering, apparently, from the memories of WWII and Pearl Harbor.
I read the entire book because I couldn't believe Worldwide would think enough of this writer to give a 3 book contract to a series that took a writer and his wife into one apparently dangerous situation after another. The ending had two climaxes, both so badly written and executed (the Pratts should have gone over a cliff and saved any readers from being subjected to Book 3) that one of the overly-written and detailed parts had me exclaiming "You have to be kidding!" aloud.
November 30, 2019
Pretty trite. Lots of exraneous material that didn't do anything to enhance the plot.
May 15, 2012
ISBN 0373260962 - This is my first Tony and Pat Pratt book, so I might not know enough about the pair to judge well. That said, Murder Without Reservation is well-written - strong on details, nice relationship between the Pratts and good character development. However, "sleuthing team" seems to me to be a tremendous overstatement of what the Pratts do.
Tony is working with a Japanese TV crew on an Indian Reservation in the middle of Oregon when things begin to go wrong. From snakes in his room to a raging fire, the shooting seems cursed. Speaking of shooting, someone's taken a shot at JayDee Hampton, a local cowboy with ties to the Millers - the family whose cattle the TV crew is using. Not everyone is happy to have the "Japs" in town; how far will they go to get them to leave? After Gramps Miller dies, the big question seems to be, will the TV movie get finished before a star is killed?
Tony seems to just happen to be there when things go wrong and the answers just sort of seem to materialize naturally, without his or Pat's sleuthing. If you're looking for the light fluffy adventures of a middle-aged couple, this book is just right. As a mystery, not so very much; the bad guy's are evident from the start, the detecting is almost non-existent and the best parts of the book might be Lee's ability to describe almost anything in minute detail.
- AnnaLovesBooks
Tony is working with a Japanese TV crew on an Indian Reservation in the middle of Oregon when things begin to go wrong. From snakes in his room to a raging fire, the shooting seems cursed. Speaking of shooting, someone's taken a shot at JayDee Hampton, a local cowboy with ties to the Millers - the family whose cattle the TV crew is using. Not everyone is happy to have the "Japs" in town; how far will they go to get them to leave? After Gramps Miller dies, the big question seems to be, will the TV movie get finished before a star is killed?
Tony seems to just happen to be there when things go wrong and the answers just sort of seem to materialize naturally, without his or Pat's sleuthing. If you're looking for the light fluffy adventures of a middle-aged couple, this book is just right. As a mystery, not so very much; the bad guy's are evident from the start, the detecting is almost non-existent and the best parts of the book might be Lee's ability to describe almost anything in minute detail.
- AnnaLovesBooks
September 21, 2015
It really wasn't that bad of a read. The story itself I liked. Dialogue was a bit silly at times, and some parts of the story seemed rushed along rather than letting them come together.
December 10, 2013
Actually, I could see this couple as a tv show detective pair
October 30, 2014
Tony and Pat, snake in room, making a Japanese TV show.
Don't bother.
Don't bother.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews