January 2022 Group Read - Deadly Appearances

[Martha]

This thread is for discussion of our January group read - by Gail Bowen. This is the first in a series of books about Canada's leading female amateur sleuth. We will begin on Jan. 15.

I will leave this thread open in case anyone wants to start early & comment. Please try to warn of spoilers.

[Melissa (ladybug)]

Looking forward to it.

[Martha]

I decided to use an audible credit for this book. I’m still trying to finish my current audible selection before starting our group read. I’ve never tried two audiobooks at once. I may not be able to resist though. 😄

[Melissa (ladybug)]

I was able to get a kindle book from my library onto my phone. :) Just haven't been able to get to it yet. Been busy finishing up some other books on my list. I am trying to read a book a day, so while my long read, at this time, is Odd Thomas, I am listening to short books from audible's plus catalog. My next long read scheduled is Deadly Appearances. I hope to finish Odd Thomas this weekend. :)

[Martha]

I'd like to read Odd Thomas again. I loved it ... the movie, not so much. :-)

[Book Concierge]

My library system does not have this at all, though we do have a couple of the later books in the series. I'll see if I can get an Inter-Library loan.

[Melissa (ladybug)]

Well, I finished it. Not a great book to my thinking. It was mah, ok. so a 2 stars from me. I did not like any of the characters even the kids. Warning: don't read on if you haven't finished because I do include spoilers.

(view spoiler)[If my mom was so sick as Jo was I would never have believed it was just grief, stress, or all in her head. What is with her daughter telling Rick that she (Jo) would rather die than let her kids see her sick?

She has a psychiatrist as a friend that she speaks to regularly and I believe her friend would recognize if she were having mental problems causing her to be this extremely sick. I would also not be piddle padding around and not going to every doctor I could think of to see what is wrong.

I also guessed who it was extremely early in the book. Jo gave it away around the time she started talking about writing a book about Andy.

Jo also exemplified almost everything I hate about politicians.

The put downs of Christians (and implying that they are mentally not all there, naive, or students too young to know better), the inclusion of witches and witchcraft at one point of the story. The casual racism, elitism, ableism, and put downs. While I am aware this was normal in this time period all this and more caused me to not really like this story. I was unable to look past it. This book was extremely dated and while I have no problems with "dated" books it was jarring. I will not be reading on in the series even if it improves. I have way more books that are good waiting to be read. :) lol (hide spoiler)]

[Martha]

Melissa (ladybug) wrote: "Well, I finished it. Not a great book to my thinking. It was mah, ok. so a 2 stars from me. I did not like any of the characters even the kids. Warning: don't read on if you haven't finished becaus..."

Well, that's a bummer. I'll continue with it, but I've found that while I can read more than one book at a time, I cannot listen to more than one at a time. So I've started my other one over as I was getting confused. Then I'll move on to DA.

Any idea on what you want to read next? I can do a random thing if you'd prefer.

[Martha]

Just saw your comment on the other thread. Thanks.

[Martha]

I finally finished the other audiobook so I can restart this one and hopefully get through it pretty quickly. It doesn't seem like that long of a book.

[Martha]

I finished it and give it 3 stars. OK, not great though. I would be willing to try the next in the series.

[Melissa (ladybug)]

You are braver than me. lol. Don't want to try the next book. If It doesn't catch my attention in the first book, I tend to not continue on with a series.

[Martha]

I won’t be going out of my way to get the next one. It would have to fall in my lap free of charge. 😄 I agree with your review which I just read a few minutes ago. So much of it didn’t ring true.

We’ve had some dumb ones lately, haven’t we?!

[Melissa (ladybug)]

Some really dumb ones. :)