Brennan's New Series Starts with a Dud

The Third to Die - Allison Brennan

When you read at least fifty mystery or thriller novels a year, you can’t always depend on a half-dozen or so favorite authors to have a new release ready for you when you finish your latest. As a consequence, I read a lot of novels written by authors whose work, to be kind, I will probably not seek out again in the future. The latest in my string of one-and-dones is Allison Brennan, who released The Third to Die – Quinn & Costa Thriller Book 1 last year. Given the pace of Brennan’s work, she’s probably already finished number four. Here’s the plot in about 115 words:

Carey Baldwin's Stolen a day of My Life

Stolen - Carey Baldwin

 

“For a moment, he just held her, his hand coasting up and down her back in time with the rhythm of her heart as it beat against his.” I don’t normally begin a book review with a quotation from the book… but this time I wanted you to know what kind of torture I put myself through to finish Stolen, an installment in the Carey Baldwin romance-mystery Cassidy and Spenser series. Let’s dissect that… stuff: first, “coasting” is a ridiculous verb in this setting. Second, is he really rubbing her back at something like 70 stokes per minute? And third, if her heart is beating against his, the two had better be conjoined twins! I won’t go so far as to say that all of Stolen is this poorly written, but way too much of it is. First, though, here’s the story:

When Romantic Mysteries Go Awry

Pathogen - Jessica L. Webb

On the one hand, we have harried ER physician Kate Morrison, MD. On the other hand, we have upright RCMP sergeant Andy Wyles. They just happen to be in love. Great love life or not, Kate’s work life is miserable right now, so when Andy’s superior officer asks for her help with a case in which a medical question may be tangentially related, the good doctor jumps at the chance to spend a couple of days in a wealthy enclave in British Columbia’s primo ski country.

People in Hidden Valley have been coming down with a killer flu. So why’s the RCMP involved? Apparently one of the wealthiest of the wealthy is running for Parliament and “a journalist” asked him a disturbing question about his constituents’ health. Thus, Andy, with Kate in tow, head for the hills.

This Geek Girl Adventure Reads More Like Stephanie Plum

No One Lives Twice - Julie Moffet

If you listen to the news at all, you probably know that women are underrepresented in the tech sector (not to mention often subjected to unpleasant working environments). In the literary world, however, a few “geek girls” have made their appearance. One that recently came across my e-reader was Lexi Carmichael, whose first adventure was 2010’s No One Lives Twice.

Lexi, who works for the NSA, first realizes she’s embroiled in something strange when not one but two suspicious dudes demand that she fork over the papers her best friend Basia sent her. "What papers?" she wonders... Well, it turns out that Basia had sent her the papers, she just hadn’t gotten ‘em yet. But all the papers are is a generic contract with a little coded message at the bottom of one page, the word “Acheron” in a simplistic code. Which, of course, geeky Lexi figures out immediately. Those papers start Lexi on a hunt for Basia and her Polish-born cousin that will take her across the Atlantic and force her boyish (i.e., flat-chested) body up against those of not one, not two, but three different hotties.

Casey Duncan and the Biggest Locked-Room Mystery Ever

City of the Lost: A Thriller - Kelley Armstrong

Meet Casey Duncan, a homicide cop in some random Canadian town who’s hiding a deep, dark secret. A dozen years ago, Casey murdered her sometime boyfriend; she put him down like a rabid dog when she was only eighteen. He may well have deserved it, but…Ever since that day in Calgary, Casey has been pretty much on the run. She must be a bit self-destructive, though, since she likes to tell therapists about killing Brian to see if they’ll turn her in… and this time, the latest one does

That's why Casey's on the run again – except that this time instead of heading for another city, she and her best friend Diana head for a town Diana had heard of in rumors, a place where everyone in town is hiding from something (for a fee, of course).  Diana, who's running from an abusive ex-husband, and Casey join the population of the City of the Lost. That’s how the two end up sequestered in a tiny town deep in the wilds of Canada’s Yukon, among people who are all hiding from someone or something – and a few of whom are also hiding something.

The Fat Twin

Nowhere Girl - Susan Strecker

Do identical twins have a supernatural bond, the ability to communicate across time and space in a way no one else can penetrate? Cady Bernard certainly believes they do – and she should know, since she’s an identical twin. That is, she was: once. Sixteen years ago; half her life; Cady’s twin sister Savannah died…. a homicide… her body found in an abandoned house on the hill behind their high school. Cady knew without being told that her sister was gone.

Time files. After battling self-abuse (cutting, attempted suicide) in the aftermath of her sister’s death, Cady grew up and became a best-selling author… an author who writes what she knows: murder. She’s (unhappily) married to a bassoon-tooting psychiatrist she suspects is 1) ashamed that she makes more money than he does and 2) probably playing hide-the-salami with his waiflike receptionist. Because, although Savannah Martino was gorgeous, luminous, slim and lovely; twin sis Cadence was and remains the “chubby” one. Apparently epigenesis rules…