Disappointing. While I loved hearing the inside scoop on what goes on at a mystery conference, this was far from my favorite Jane Jeffry book. All the regular elements are there -- Jane and Shelley, a mystery, and interesting characters -- but the characters seem to trot in and out without much development. And Jane and Shelley seemed particularly catty in this book, especially in regards to judging others they come in contact with.
The warmth of previous books is missing while the two wine and dine and shop (and make snarky remarks about their fellow attendees).
The mystery is pretty transparent, too, and not even fully resolved at the end of the book.
After looking forward to this one for so long, I was disappointed.
Cute, but not up to the usual standard Needed some light reading over Thanksgiving weekend. It had been a while since I'd read one of the Jane Jeffry `cozy' mysteries, but I remembered liking the few I'd read well enough. Churchill was one of the first to make parody titles (War and Peas, The Merchant of Menace, etc) so popular, although that joke's been around long enough now that it comes off more than a little kitschy these days.
Anyway, I found this one in hardcover at Half Price books for $5 bucks, and I liked the cover (a cat peering at an open book, a jar of spilled red ink nearby) and the premise: Jane is attending a nearby mystery writers' convention so she can hobnob with some of her favorite authors and maybe interest an agent or two in her own first stab at fiction. She drags her faithful friend Shelley along, and together they encounter the usual crazy cast of characters: the scathing, mysogenistic book reviewer Zac, the obnoxious, costume-wearing self-pubber Vernetta, and an unknown spy in the mix known only as Ms. Mystery, who makes a career out of attending writer's conferences, eavesdropping on conversations, then running back to her blog to publish all the nasty, juicy bits she's gleaned.
Naturally, no mystery writer's convention would be complete without a mystery, so the attempted poisoning of one speaker and the head-bashing of Zac the woman-hater fits the bill and occupies Jane's and Shelley's time, of which they both seem to have plenty of.
I always enjoy these cute little cozies, but I have to say I seem to recall Churchill's writing being a little more skilled than what she shows here, and the characters a little more fully fleshed. Maybe it's just been too long since I've read one, or she just knocked it out on the quick. Still fun, though.
Disappointing - it's just lacking 'ooomph' The more of her books I read, the less I like them. The characters do seem a little stiff and contrived, the dialogue just doesn't quite flow... It's like the author has fairly good ideas, but just can't sculpt them together into a really pleasing book. I have to say I like the stories, not the writing. A ghostwritten book? Written quickly to fulfill a contract? I have enjoyed several of Jill Churchill's books, but this one is a true clinker in the midst. Everything seems so contrived and unrealistic. For example, one of the two main characters says something and her friend responds with, "Heaven forbid!" In another instance, the heroine calls home, after being away for a few days, to ask family members not to be doing any laundry when she gets home as she wants the washing machine free to wash her own clothes. One, who would think to call home to ask this after being gone only a couple of days? And two, what teenage daughter would be washing clothes anyway?
My First Jill Churchill Book. So Jane Jeffry and her friend Shelly are in a series of books related to this one? Oh, boy, I sure hope the others are better than this one, because the storyline is thinner than the paper it's printed on. All these two do is shop and eat, shop and eat, shop and eat. What is this, a rejected Golden Girls episode?
There wasn't even a murder in this mystery, and these two seemed to spend money like water, yet we never know where all this wealth is coming from. While learning something about the world of authors and publishing was decent enough, I just couldn't get into these characters. In fact, this story has more in common with Sandra Bell-Lundy's comic strip Between Friends, except that Between Friends has more substance. I understand Churchill has written better books, however, so won't pass up others just because this was so poorly received by fans who know her work better than I do. Thanks to other reviewers here, I know not to be shy about giving other books by this author a fair chance.
