Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Review: Snow Blind


Snow Blind (PI Julie Collins series)Snow Blind by Lori G. Armstrong

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


This was my first experience with Lori Armstrong's work, but it is the last in the series with Julie Collins. I don't know what the other books were like, but I would describe this one as bipolar.

The situation Julie and her partner Kevin are hired to investigate isn't an uncommon one for a novel by a woman writer with a female detective: find out if an old man is being exploited by the nursing home he lives in. We meet the various characters at the home, everyone from paid 'volunteers' to the requisite spunky old lady. The investigation begins...

...and then Julie is called out to her father's ranch. She battles a blizzard and painful memories while trying to save her father from a murder charge. Dark family secrets surface, some from her family, some from other families. The difference between this and the first part of the book is night and day. I was going "uh-huh, uh-huh" up till the trip to the ranch, after which things got interesting.

Eventually Armstrong takes Julie back to her assigned case, which is now only a pale distraction in comparison to the dark drama we were plunged into. Julie gets to the bottom of the case, but for me the good part of the book had already ended.

I hope the author will do more novels that focus on stories as dark and gripping as the subplot in this novel. I found it much more interesting than the more predictable 'real case'.



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