Mini-Reviews: Hollywood Sleaze And Mermaids

Hey y'all, I realize this blog has been pretty much a Dead Zone, but I have not been reading. Stress, no spoons, and oh look the Olympics are on! The good news is that I'm working an upcoming author event for a former employer and I have homework reading to do, so hopefully that will kick my butt in gear. In the meantime, here's two recent mystery/suspense reads that I got through on audiobook.  One a success and one that I was glad to be done with.

L.A. Burning by D.C. Taylor was an impulse download back in 2022 and this one started out like a house on fire. There is nothing that will hook me faster in a suspense novel quite like Los Angeles sleaze, and this book ups the ante by giving me a dynamite heroine.

Cody Bonner is the daughter of a celebrated actress, turned LA street kid, turned addict, turned bank robber. It's those last two that land her in prison at the tender age of twenty. At the start of our story she's leaving prison with one thing on her mind, find the scum responsible for her twin sister's murder. A year ago Julie's body was found on a Malibu beach and to find her killer Cody has to go back into her mother's world of Hollywood glitz, power brokers, high priced hookers misogynistic men with violent tendencies, and old high school friends swimming with the sharks. 

The world-building is great and the heroine even better (an excon bank robber!).  When the author works this as a amateur sleuth story featuring a street savvy heroine, I was hooked.  But then he chooses to morph it into a thriller, with Cody planning to murder the man she feels is responsible for Julie's death - and it kind of took the shine off a bit more me. On top of that, while the ending is action packed and very exciting, the resolution to the mystery is a bit of a no brainer.  The minute all the players were introduced I immediately pegged who was swimming up to their eyeballs in muck. 

That said, even though the mystery wasn't a brain-teaser, and I wasn't in love with the thriller aspects, this still was an enjoyable read for me.  L.A. sleaze as a setting for suspense novels is catnip for me and this delivered.  I also think this would make a dynamite series, but alas, so far this is a one off. 

Grade = B

Back in 2020 I read the first book in the Enchanted Bay cozy mystery series by Esme Addison and surprisingly liked it. Yes, even with the paranormal elements. So when the second book, A Hex for Danger came out, I proceeded to add it to my TBR pile, where it's been sitting for the past three years. 

Picking up where the last book left off, Alexsandra Daniels has decided to stay in Bellamy Bay to be close to the family she's just recently reconnected with - her Aunt Lidia who runs the local apothecary, and her two cousins, Minka and Kamila. Alex is helping to run the family business and continuing to get used to the idea of her magical heritage, being a descendant of the Mermaid of Warsaw. Alex has not only just learned of her own magical abilities but that the world is full of magicals hiding in plain sight, even right there in small town Bellamy Bay.

The town is gearing up for their annual Mermaid Festival and a local artist breezes into town to paint a mural.  This artist seems to know Alex's secret but before she can figure out how to approach that problem the artist ends up murdered. Alex's boyfriend, the local police chief, zeroes in on one of her distant cousins who has a ton of motive and opportunity. But Alex just KNOWS that Celeste is innocent! Why is Jack always arresting her family members!  There's nothing for it, she's going to prove Celeste is innocent and find the real murderer.

Is Jack a patronizing know-it-all?  Yes. But does that make Celeste look any less guilty? No. And Alex's argument is basically "She couldn't have committed the murder, she's my cousin!"  Girl, every killer is someone's son, daughter, cousin, brother, sister, mother or father. Sit down and let the grown-ups do their job. The paranormal elements, while unique and interesting in the first book, come off like twee short-cuts to mystery solving here and the plot soon gets convoluted with corporate espionage, bad guys on the hunt for lost magical weaponry, and magicals descended from dragons 🙄

But the worst of it is what I feared would happen after finishing the first book. Yep, the author tries to shoehorn in a love triangle. Never mind the other guy, a magical, has a Shady AF family, is Shady AF himself, and used black magic that very well could have killed Alex in the first book.  Look, Jack is annoying but this other guy manages to be worse.  He's the rich guy who fancies himself the altruistic do-gooder but he's actually clueless with evil tendencies. 

This was published in 2021 and a Book 3 has yet to materialize, so that doesn't instill much hope. No matter, this is where I get off regardless.

Final Grade = D