"Private investigator Sarah Booth Delaney and her friends are celebrating New Year's Eve at the party of the year, a smashing Winter White Garden party at the newly renovated King Cotton Boutique Hotel. It's a dazzling success ... until Frangelica "Sister" McFee walks through the door. Sarah Booth knew Sister in college, before Sister became a bestselling author and moved to New York, and fame and fortune don't seem to have tempered her arrogance and cruelty. Sister's latest book is a memoir about the death of her mother and brother many years ago. Now, a film about the book is in the works, and a film crew has descended upon Zinnia, Mississippi, to tell the complete story. The film crew soon realizes there may be more to the story than meets the eye--or is told in Sister's memoir--and they hire Sarah Booth to discover the absolute truth about those deaths so many years ago. But Sarah Booth quickly realizes that someone is desperate to keep the truth hidden and will go to any lengths necessary to protect a long-held secret. Carolyn Haines's next Sarah Booth Delaney novel, Sticks and Bones, is sure to delight series fans and newcomers alike"--
For whatever reason, as much as I love this series in general, this one failed to pull me in completely at the beginning. Maybe it was the movie backdrop, or the over-the-top nastiness of one of the characters, or the batshit insanity of one of the others, but it just didn't grip me. Jitty the ghost was also back to her nagging, irritating ways.
The mystery plot though was a big old snarl of a puzzle. So many suspects, so many red herrings, but a plot twist that was supposed to shock but was telegraphed early on. But still, a very good mystery.
I am though, for the record, thoroughly jacked with the way Haines is yanking her readers and Sarah Booth around over Coleman. This is the book where it stopped being moving and starting just being ridiculous. Either put them together or kill one of them off already. The suspense has officially been over-played.
Reading updates
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Started reading
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12 August, 2017:
Finished reading
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12 August, 2017:
Reviewed