Suzy Q Homemaker

Welcome to my stop on the Double Trouble blog tour!  After you read my review (and enter the giveaway) that you hop around to the other blogs who are hosting.  It’ll give you a chance to get to know some other bloggers and read some more reviews of this fun little mystery.

From the publisher:

With one solved case under her belt, PJ Sugar is ready to dive into her career as a private investigator. Or at least a PI’s assistant until she can prove herself to Jeremy Kane, her new boss. Suddenly PJ’s seeing crime everywhere. But is it just in her head, or can she trust her instincts? When she takes on her first official case-house-sitting for a witness in protective custody-Jeremy assures her there’s no danger involved. But it soon becomes clear that there is someone after the witness . . . and now they’re after PJ, too.

About the author:

Susan May Warren is the RITA award-winning author of twenty-four novels with Tyndale, Barbour and Steeple Hill. A four-time Christy award finalist, a two-time RITA Finalist, she’s also a multi-winner of the Inspirational Readers Choice award, and the ACFW Book of the Year. Her larger than life characters and layered plots have won her acclaim with readers and reviewers alike. A seasoned women’s events and retreats speaker, she’s a popular writing teacher at conferences around the nation and the author of the beginning writer’s workbook: From the Inside-Out: discover, create and publish the novel in you!. She is also the founder of www.MyBookTherapy.com, a story-crafting service that helps authors discover their voice. Susan makes her home in northern Minnesota, where she is busy cheering on her two sons in football, and her daughter in local theater productions (and desperately missing her college-age son!) A full listing of her titles, reviews and awards can be found at: www.susanmaywarren.com

First, the bad.  There are a few literary elements in the book that annoyed me.  It happened in the first book and I was surprised that the same mistakes were made in the second.  You see, when an author describes something and uses that description more than once, it stands out.  Three times in the first book, the author wrote that cool air “prickled” PJ’s skin.  Three times!  In the second book, cool air of some sort “raised gooseflesh”.  So what is it about her skin that is so interesting?  I found those descriptions incredibly annoying and unnecessary.

Moving on!

I really enjoyed the story.  It was easy to get caught up in the mystery to the extent that I could not put it down; I stayed up way past my bedtime reading just so I could know what happened next.  It’s books like this–the ones that keep me up–that I love the most.

My favorite character is Dally’s “neighbor” Gabby, an old woman who is so colorful and real that I wish she was my neighbor (Dally is the witness PJ is house sitting for).  When PJ took on Dally’s persona, she also stepped into a new relationship with Gabby which quickly turned into a deep friendship.

What I liked most about this book was the way PJ grew as a person.  I’m the same age as PJ, and though our lives are completely different by comparison, it’s comforting to know that even at our age, we don’t have to have everything figured out.  If you read the first book, you know that PJ is essentially starting over, having just moved back to her home town after ten years of running from her past–a past that includes a high school sweetheart named Boone.  Boone isn’t too keen on PJ’s new career as a private investigator, but he still wants to rekindle their relationship.  Not only that, but he’s a little jealous of PJ’s relationship with her boss Jeremy.

So there’s a lot going on in Double Trouble that’ll keep you on your toes!

Win my books!

One of you will win my copy of Double Trouble and the first book in the series, Nothing but Trouble.  To enter, leave me a comment with the title of your favorite mystery novel.    Did you read Nancy drew when you were growing up?  Or are you a Mary Higgins Clark fan?

For additional entries, leave a comment for each of the following:

• Become a fan of Susan May Warren on facebook
• Visit another blog on the Double Trouble blog tour and leave them a nice comment
• Subscribe to any of my blog feeds
• Become a fan of Suzy Q Homemaker on facebook
• Tweet about this giveaway

I’ll close comments and draw a winner on March 1st.  U.S. and Canada only, please.  Good luck!

Tags: book reviews, books, giveaways, reading

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