Book Review: Immaculate Midnight

Reviewed By: Woodstock - RAM

Immaculate Midnight     Amazon US PB Amazon US HC Amazon Canada PB Amazon Canada HC
Ellen Hart
Class/Genre:   Mystery
Series: Jane Lawless # 11
…

This book is the first I have read by this author - and the other reviews appearing with the BooksnBytes listing give a good synopsis of the plot, so I'll comment on other features of this book which pleased me. Writing a book which is part of a continuing series must always be a challenge to the author. Returning readers will be completely familiar with the characters, the settings, the relationships. Others (like me) will be total novices. The author's task is to update the new reader with details so that the characters' actions and motivations make sense, but keep to a minimum the repetitions of prior events so that the returning reader is not bored.

Hart did an excellent job with this. We learn enough about Jane Lawless to be curious about earlier events. (and be inclined to buy copies of the prior entries in the series) Yet the action focuses on what occurs in this book, and this situation. Jane's friends, family, romantic interest, and a delightful new canine friend all inhabit the pages and all the action is fresh and new. We learn enough about prior events to have Jane's current reactions make sense, we don't relive all the prior events in boring detail.

One negative comment - all the main characters appear in the first 70 pages. I had my suspicions about one of them in her (or his) first appearance and as it turned out - the character I suspected was the perpetrator. This by no means spoils a book for me, but one of the joys of mystery fiction for my taste is a surprise at the end.

Woodstock - RAM

Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Woodstock - RAM