Helpful Score: 1
Good story but not enough of Ali Reynolds. The second one with a heavy hospital setting. It had a feeling of "been there, done that."
Helpful Score: 1
With quite a few story lines going on at the same time, from the beginning the reader is swept into a world in Arizona where a small town is hit with murders and mayhem. The true adventure is trying to find out where all the stories will connect and who is at the center of it all.
At the center of it all is Ali Reynolds who is trying to get to the heart of this town's problems and find out why people end up dead, shot or badly beaten. A cop, a missing girl and the local postman are all involved with the drama the town is having to get to the bottom of. I have said this many times, but I can not reveal the whos and the whats because this is so worth the read!
This review is short and to the point - I loved it.
At the center of it all is Ali Reynolds who is trying to get to the heart of this town's problems and find out why people end up dead, shot or badly beaten. A cop, a missing girl and the local postman are all involved with the drama the town is having to get to the bottom of. I have said this many times, but I can not reveal the whos and the whats because this is so worth the read!
This review is short and to the point - I loved it.
I like it very much. I enjoy reading J.A. Jance books. I like her Joanna Brady books and also this Ali Reynolds set.
What a great story, each one of this series has been different enough and done in such a way to completely hold your interest. Looking forward to the next one.
Sleepy Santa Cruz County Arizona has suddenly broken out in mayhem. A small-time pimp is found dead in his car. A border patrol officer discovers a teenage girl, savagely beaten and left to die in the remote desert. A young county cop is shot down in a routine traffic stop gone awry. And that's just the beginning of the body count in what turns out â even with all the violence â to be a tepid and overplotted mystery-without-mystery and suspense-without-suspense novel.
J.A. Jance is a prolific writer of crime novels, with her Joanna Brady series arguably the best of the bunch. But she may be spreading herself too thin with the Ali Reynolds books in addition to the J.P. Beaumont and Walker family mystery series.
Reynolds is essentially just a marginal figure here as various friends and acquaintances try to figure out why the injured policeman is being painted as a cop gone bad, and how to keep the beating victim alive long enough to identify her assailant. Most of the law enforcement figures in the book are painted as either crooked, lazy, or dim, and of course it's up to Reynolds and the other characters (mostly the other characters) to unravel the tangle.
J.A. Jance is a prolific writer of crime novels, with her Joanna Brady series arguably the best of the bunch. But she may be spreading herself too thin with the Ali Reynolds books in addition to the J.P. Beaumont and Walker family mystery series.
Reynolds is essentially just a marginal figure here as various friends and acquaintances try to figure out why the injured policeman is being painted as a cop gone bad, and how to keep the beating victim alive long enough to identify her assailant. Most of the law enforcement figures in the book are painted as either crooked, lazy, or dim, and of course it's up to Reynolds and the other characters (mostly the other characters) to unravel the tangle.
Excellent. Great story, great characters. Ali Reynolds is growing on me with every book. She has an interesting group of friends and I love the way they are being woven into the storyline as the series unfolds.
Very good book...Keeps you guessing until the end...
Beautiful Copy!
I ended up enjoying Left for Dead from the very first paragraph. The Ali Reynolds's feel was back, the story flowed and the subject matter was more believable.
Teenage Rose Ventana left her family's home and became Breeze Domingo. Living a life of prostitution, she is traded to a horrible man when her pimp ran up a debt he could not pay. When Breeze outlived her usefulness, she is dumped in the desert to die. Barely alive, Rose is found by Alonzo Gutierrez, a border patrol agent, his superior's fluff her off as just another illegal, but Alonzo knows differently and does a little investigating on his own.
Jose Reyes, a friend of Ali's from the academy years is shot and left for dead, but there is something troubling when drugs and money are found in his trunk and somehow it is all tied back to a post office worker and his new lady friend.
Bring in Sister Anselm, a dear friend of Ali's and in JA Jance's usual fashion, the narratives are melded into one storyline and the reader has an ah-ha moment where everything comes together. Not always in a happily ever after ending, more along the lines of a "this is the best that we could hope for" moment.
Ali's parents have also surprised the family with a big announcement that will surely bring more interest and challenge to her already full life. You never know what that Edie Larson will think up next and I look forward to seeing what direction this series will take.
I ended up enjoying Left for Dead from the very first paragraph. The Ali Reynolds's feel was back, the story flowed and the subject matter was more believable.
Teenage Rose Ventana left her family's home and became Breeze Domingo. Living a life of prostitution, she is traded to a horrible man when her pimp ran up a debt he could not pay. When Breeze outlived her usefulness, she is dumped in the desert to die. Barely alive, Rose is found by Alonzo Gutierrez, a border patrol agent, his superior's fluff her off as just another illegal, but Alonzo knows differently and does a little investigating on his own.
Jose Reyes, a friend of Ali's from the academy years is shot and left for dead, but there is something troubling when drugs and money are found in his trunk and somehow it is all tied back to a post office worker and his new lady friend.
Bring in Sister Anselm, a dear friend of Ali's and in JA Jance's usual fashion, the narratives are melded into one storyline and the reader has an ah-ha moment where everything comes together. Not always in a happily ever after ending, more along the lines of a "this is the best that we could hope for" moment.
Ali's parents have also surprised the family with a big announcement that will surely bring more interest and challenge to her already full life. You never know what that Edie Larson will think up next and I look forward to seeing what direction this series will take.
