Short and Sweet(?) Reviews

Review of What You Want to See (Roxane Weary 2)

Blurb: Marin Strasser has a secret. Her fiancé thinks her secret is that she’s having an affair, and he hires P.I. Roxane Weary to prove it. Then, just days into the case, Marin is shot to death on a side street in an apparent mugging. But soon enough the police begin to focus on Roxane’s client for Marin’s death, so she starts to dig deeper into Marin’s life—discovering that the elegant woman she’s been following has a past and a half, including two previous marriages, an adult son fresh out of prison, and a criminal record of her own. The trail leads to a crew of con artists, an ugly real estate scam that defrauds unsuspecting elderly homeowners out of their property, and the suspicious accident of a wealthy older woman who lives just down the street from where Marin was killed.

With Roxane’s client facing a murder indictment, the scammers hit close to home to force Roxane to drop the case, and it becomes clear that the stakes are as high as the secrets run deep.

Another excellent page-turning entry in the Roxane Weary world, with Roxane taking on what should be an easy case that blows up before her eyes. Lots of twists and turns and then there’s the trainwreck that is Roxane’s life, although she’s holding back on the liquor a bit, realizing that it doesn’t help her make good choices. One of those bad choices is her obsession with Catherine, her old lover who is currently available.

A good mystery if you’re looking for something gripping for a summer read.

---

rating:

4 butterflies and a ladybug out of 5 butterflies

---

Blurb: A late-night phone call is never good news, especially when you’re Roxane Weary. This one is from her brother Andrew, whose evening was interrupted by an urgent visit from Addison, a hip young DJ and one-time fling, who turns up at his apartment scared and begging to use his phone. She leaves as quickly as she appeared, but now Andrew is worried—especially when Addison never makes it home and her friends and family demand to know where she is. As the police begin to suspect that something may have happened to her, and that Andrew is involved, Roxane tracks Addison’s digital footprint as she goes deeper and deeper into the events preceding her disappearance. Meanwhile, a cop is found dead on the opposite side of town, leading to a swirl of questions surrounding a dance club whose staff—which includes Addison—has suddenly gone AWOL. As Roxane struggles to distinguish the truth from the stories people tell about themselves online, it’s clear that the mystery of Addison’s whereabouts is just the beginning.

You may have noticed that I read all three Roxane Weary novels very close together, which allowed me to see just how flawed this third novel, The Stories You Tell, is.

Roxane is drinking less but is now supposedly in a stable relationship with Catherine. The case itself is boring and not much happens for most of the middle part. The ending, though, is exciting.

However, to get to the ending, there is man-bashing, comments about how Roxane is worried about straight people (which may be ironic considering how dysfunctional her relationship is with Catherine), Roxane being straight-out judgy about everyone (which could have been snark but it fell well short of being either observant or funny). And, to add to the confusion of Roxane’s observations regarding how disgusting straight men are is that her former lover, Tom, seems to be the only stable one in sight and she even refers to him as the one who she can always count on.

All in all, The Stories You Tell compared to the previous two novels was a bit painful to read, especially expectation-wise. It’s not a bad book, but it just is nowhere near as good as the previous two. I have the ARC of the fourth novel next week. Let’s hope that this one was a fluke.

---

rating: 

3 out of 5 butterflies

---

---