BIBLIOGRAPHIC DETAILS:
(Available in Print: (1985), 12/29/2009; PUBLISHER: Harper; ISBN: 978-0061958519; PAGES: 336; Unabridged.)
(Available as Digital)
This edition-Audio: COPYRIGHT: 1/21/2005; PUBLISHER: Books in Motion; DURATION: 08:14:17; PARTS: 7; Unabridged; FILE SIZE: 237613 KB
Feature Film or tv?: No

SERIES:
J.P. Beaumont Book 1

MAJOR CHARACTERS:
(I was listening rather than reading, so may not have spelled names correctly)
Jonas Piedmont Beaumont-J.P. Beaumont (Beau)—Seattle Washington Detective Karen – former wife of Beau
Ron Peters—New partner of Beau
Anne Corley – Beau’s love interest
Ralph Ames -- Anne's lawyer
Angela Barstogi -- Child victim
Suzanne Barstogi -- Child's mother
Pastor Michael Brodie -- Community religious leader

SUMMARY/ EVALUATION:
For a detailed summary complete with spoilers see http://www.reviewingtheevidence.com/review.html?id=1732

Briefly? A child is found dead, and suspects abound.
I picked this book because I was looking for a good mystery author with a series to tide me over while I wait for Michael Connelly, or Robert Galbraith to publish their next books. I remembered that the last time I attended an event at the Fieldstead Foundation, where a friend of mine is a cataloger, that among their many bookshelves was a huge collection of J. A. Jance books. It got me curious about the type of novels the author writes, but I never remembered when it was time to pick something new to listen to, until now.
This is the first of many books in this series—something between 23 and 26, I can’t recall exactly. I like that the story was not too graphic or violent, that the protagonist does not have any particularly bothersome vices, that there was no focus on torture or cruelty—in short, that it was a nice old-fashioned, mystery.

AUTHOR:
J. A. (Judith Ann) Jance -- (born October 27, 1944) "Jance was born in Watertown, South Dakota,[2] and raised in Bisbee, Arizona (the setting for her Joanna Brady series of novels). Before becoming an author, she worked as a school librarian on a Native American reservation (Tohono O'Odham), and as a teacher and insurance agent." – Wikipedia

NARRATOR:
Gene Engene -- "Gene Engene is an award-winning reader with an astounding catalog of audiobooks to his credit. He is best known as J.P. Beaumont in the J.A. Jance mystery series. Gene is a veteran stage actor, director, and is a retired Professor of Drama at Eastern Washington University." -- Books in Motion

GENRE:
Mystery; Fiction

LOCATIONS:
Washington State

TIME FRAME:
Contemporary (1985)

SUBJECTS:
Murder; Child abuse; Religious cults

DEDICATION:
"To Jay, Jeanne, and Josh, and bargain matinees everywhere."

SAMPLE QUOTATION:
From Chapter 1

"She was probably a cute kid once, four maybe five years old. It was hard to tell that now. She was dead. The murder weapon was a pink Holly Hobbie gown. What little was left of it was still twisted around her neck. It wasn't pretty, but murder never is.
Her body had rolled thirty feet down a steep embankment from the roadway, tossed out like so much garbage. She was still tangled in a clump of blackberry bushes when we got there. As far as I could see, there was no sign of a struggle. It looked to me as though she had been dead several hours, but a final determination on that would have to wait for the experts.
My name is Beaumont. I've been around homicide for fifteen years, but that doesn't mean I didn't want to puke. I was careful not to think about my own kids right then. You can't afford to. If you do, you crack up."

RATING:
4 stars.

STARTED READING – FINISHED READING
3-30-2022 to 4-5-2022 ( )

(1985)Pretty good police procedural/mystery that introduced Seattle Detective J.P. Beaumont. He is swept off his feat by a woman writing a book about child abuse while investigating a child's murder. She turns out to be a deadly avenging angel who is out to rid her world of child abusers.

My overall impression of this book is that I didn't like it. I've decided I really don't like the 'hero' J.P. Beaumont. He's not a very good detective and he shows he's much too passive here. He was too easily seduced by the woman in red and I never really quite believed her character at all. Unfortunately, she turned out to be even more key to the story than I was led to believe.

That being said, the writing is not too bad. The Seattle settings are vivid. The supporting characters and plot are interesting. And the overall plot was imaginative and surprising. I just won't be spending any more time with detective Beaumont right now. ( )

Sick ( )

Sick ( )