Reviewed by Berls on
I continue to really enjoy this series - it may be replacing Will Robie as my favorite David Bladacci series with this book! First Family was unexpected in a lot of ways and left me eager for more.
The primary mystery of this book revolved around the kidnapping of the first lady's eldest niece. We actually get the point of view of the kidnapper, so the question isn't who did it (although Sean and Michelle are working to solve that mystery) but for us the question is why. And I was stumped until pretty much the reveal. It also really had me confused on who exactly I was rooting for and left me with conflicted feelings about one character (although not on the bad guys... which who that is was a bit more complex than initially appeared).
Secondarily, Michelle's past is catching up to her along with a mystery to solve with a family tragedy that occurs in the middle of the investigation. I was hoping she would face this past sooner than later and I was really happy with how it was handled. I was even happier with how moving forward finally seems to have opened space for the relationship between Michelle and Sean to grow from friendship and partners to a romantic one. We'll have to see how that develops in future books, but I'm excited!
I listened to First Family, narrated by Ron McLarty. His narration and delivery of voices works really well for me. He does solid female voices, which isn't always the case with male narrators. And I've found that all David Baldacci's audio books have a really great sound production in general (at least all I've read so far), so I always enjoy listening to them at my normal 2x speed.
Reading updates
- Started reading
- 15 January, 2023: Finished reading
- 15 January, 2023: Reviewed