Book & Baking Blog Entry 28

So, Baking has been working out pretty well.  I have the makings for 8 gingerbread houses (3 more to go), made Christmas tree cookies with the kids' names and a whole bunch more cookies for the kids to decorate themselves.  I was up late (not a thing for me) but, since I'm bucking for "mama of the year" (at least with my kid) I didn't mind and felt VERY accomplished.  But I'd rather talk about books.
So what have I been reading. Well.  You do often get what you pay for.  I paid very little for a new title called Loose Ends by Terri Reid and got what I got was adequate.  I'm actually trying to decide whether or not to give another of these novels a chance.  This is a Mary O'Reilly mystery.  I really hate that they have to tell you that so that you can rush out and buy more of the "fabulous series."  Here's a clue.  If the author and characters are good, we don't need to have it written on the front of the book.  We can read (the point of a book) and can figure it out for ourselves.


Mary O'Reilly, not to be stereotyped, is a nice Irish girl with a close family, and all of her parents, grandparents, and siblings are Chicago cops.  Gee, there's a stretch.  Now Mary died and was brought back to life and, here's our fun, she can now see and talk to ghosts.  Nice. So she uses ghosts to help her be a detective in a small town where she has to live so that she's not inundated by her new paranormal friends.  There's a chief of police who is also new to this small town and he, amazingly, has a missing wife and baby who've been gone for 8 years.  Never found.  Oh, well, the baby was still in-utero so we don't know that he actually has a kid.  Now he tells people he's married and seems to think that he is.  Nice in a way, creepy in another to NOT ACKNOWLEDGE after 8 years that your wife is gone.  All Mary knows about our chief is that he's a stud (of course) and tells her that he's married (doesn't mention the disappearance--I'm not really sure that these two are friends.)


Overall this book was a decent read. It was a bit stilted and seemed a bit amateurish (like I should talk.)  The story also kind of just happened.  There was no rhyme nor reason:  it happens because the author said it did.  Just like the relationships are because the author has told us that they are.  She tells us that Mary is a loner.  A loner who depends upon her 2 best friends, the geriatric gruesome-twosome.  She is also a loner who is close to her big, Irish, cop family.  Not getting the loner part, but Reid says she is....

Reid takes two mysteries and, of course, in the end, they are related.  Big surprise.  This was telegraphed in the initial pages of the book so I dont' think that it's a SPOILER but maybe.  I was amazed after all of the "telling" that Reid does we never find out WHY the serial killer changed from killing small dark haired girls to blonds.  The point was made over and over that the final child killed was different from the others and our ghost talker just "felt" that it was the same killer BUT we never get any resolution why such an anomaly.

I wanted to like this book more and am tempted to try another.  At least for the price it's not breaking the bank.

Happy reading, Happy Holidays!