Customer Reviews

Damage Control (Joanna Brady, Bk 13)

5 star:		(21)
4 star:		(21)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Popular Arizona author J. A. Jance is an expert at opening her stories with grabbers. She pulls this off again in Damage Control by introducing Lauren Dayson, a young woman, "a good girl daughter" in jeopardy.

After Lauren's junior year in college she had moved in with Rick Mosier . He was kind of a wild guy, prone to carrying knives in his backpack. She was sure pairing with him would drive her parents crazy. Rebellion time for this once obedient daughter!

Nonetheless, Rick had once fascinated her - until he blackened her eye for supposedly flirting then later broke her arm. Fascination turned to fear so she moved into her own apartment, had window bars installed, even bought and learned how to shoot a Glock 26 semiautomatic. He had sworn that he would get to her even though she "papered Pima County with restraining orders," and she believed him.

Awakened one night by the barking of her little dog, Lauren just knew Rick had broken in. Mustering all of her courage, she sat up in bed , waiting until a tall form entered her room and then she fired - again and again and again. She had killed him and she had every right to save for the fact that the dead man was not Rick.

Case 1 for Cochise County Sheriff Joanna Brady. It doesn't seem difficult, and what Joanna doesn't need is anything tough as she's a hard working mom to a baby and a teenager, married to a writer, and her mother doesn't make life easy. True to form, of course, it is a very tough case - not at all what it seems.

Then Case 2 faces her when an old car drives through a retaining wall to do a half gainer off a mountain side. It's necessary to use a helicopter to reach the victims, but victims aren't all Joanna discovers. It seems that everywhere she turns new clues turn up revealing a much darker side to events as well as information of a personal nature.

With this, the 13th in the Joanna Brady series, Jance slows down not a bit but continues at full throttle to entertain and intrigue countless readers.

- Gail Cooke

I have not read all of the Joanna Brady books so not sure how her character has morphed but I found Joanna's character to be a bit annoying in this one. (I have read a couple others and didn't find her quite so annoying in the other 2) I don't know if the author is intentionally making her an insecure character or it's just the way I'm preceiving it. She is never home and when she is she finds fault with all of Butch's decisions. Someone has to take care of things. She has a baby boy she hardly spends any time with and when she does I don't sense any cuddling or caring about what she's doing. The same with Butch-now this isn't a romance book but this is her husband and other than a quick peck on the cheek that's it and that usually comes from Butch. She has to be in control at all times at work also. Her staff is quite capable of making decisions and Frank even advises her from time to time that she's making a mistake but she won't back down because she ALWAYS has to make the decision. No wonder he leaves by the end of the book. And how lame was it when one of her deputies gets killed and she goes on and on about how it was his own fault because he didn't call for back up. IT didn't seem like when you heard a noise that you would immediately call for back up but want to check it out first. It might have just been an animal prowling and by the time back up came it would probably have been too late anyway.

The mystery itself might have been okay as a storyline but I just felt Joanna personnaly was very annoying. Even the suspicion that her husband had an affair. Years after his death she looks at a picture on the wall of the break room and sees a blonde woman and suddenly thinks her husband was having an affair with her. That was pretty far out!

Then I got the idea from another book that they both had come into money but in this one they talk like they can hardly make ends meet!???

I gave it 3 stars because the mystery part was somewhat interesting. However on the front of the book it says "A Novel of Suspense" H-m-m-m! I kept waiting for the suspense! Wasn't there!

J A Jance has been writing the Joanna Brady series for a long time and the writing and storytelling remain consistently good. I really enjoy that there is more than one plot-line going on throughout the story. The characters are very well-developed and I'm involved in the story from the first page. This book, how it brings a weekend of crime, and then integrates it with Joanna's personal life was well-written, and moved along at a fast clip. My only complaints about this book would involve some character changes that apparently will appear in the next book, I'm a bit disappointed in those changes. But this was another great story for Joanna Brady.

Length:: 9:58 Mins

Hey folks,

I interviewed JA Jance about her new book DAMAGE CONTROL. Hopefully you'll find this helpful and interesting!

Stacey Cochran
Author of CLAWS available for 80 Cents

Warning: spoilers

Now, I love Joanna Brady. I love the series so much I drove hours from Tucson TWICE to visit Bisbee. But this book was a frustrating read. I kept waiting for the main story line to begin, only instead of a main story line, it was a series of fragmented stories. No mention of the beauty of the desert in Cochise County, no mention that Butch is apparently set for life after selling his restaurant in Glendale, or that Joanna inherited $300K in insurance money after her first husband was murdered, no mention of lots of details that were established in earlier books. I find that insulting. And how did Jenny get Kiddo her horse to Cassie's place? Off the highways, it's all mountain and steep gorges 'round those parts.

What else? Oh yes: a 4 month old does not get bottles at night any longer. Especially if the 4 month is started on solid food. Joanna and Butch and baby should be sleeping more during the night. And Joanna doesn't spend nearly as much time as she should with her baby. She has deputies! I'm a working mother too, but the descriptions of Joanna's days without meals or sleep are ridiculous. Why does she have to come off as a superwoman or martyr? It's the worst portrayal, in my opinion, of Joanna since "Partners in Crime" (one case with JP and she's ready to abandon Butch?).

The opening chapter set such a tone of terror but its denouement (for this strand of the story) was so unsatisfactory, I wanted to throw the book in disgust.

And how did Larry Wolfe manage to drive from Cochise County to Hudspeth County Texas in something like 2 hours? Just to drive from Gallup NM to Albuquerque takes on the order of 4 hrs, and that's only half across NM.

Joanna's stepfather just ups and quits on her right after Frank Montoya tells her he's in for Chief of Sierra Vista- and she's down a deputy due to the death of the rookie! What will she do, hire Dick Voland back to be Chief Deputy? I don't think so. The entire shtick with Eleanor made zero sense (when did Eleanor ever?), but to wrap it up with George quitting and Eleanor and George motoring off, towing a Mazda Miata to Minnesota (at $4.50 a gal for gas) made me wonder if Jance is losing her zest for Joanna. She's long said that JP Beaumont is her favorite creation and that's fine. But if she's going to dilute the Joanna Brady series by writing this kind of loose pablum she's going to loose a significant fan base, the one that doesn't like her 3 other series.

Maybe that's what happens when authors leave too much time elapse between books in a series. The Joanna Brady series is one of my favorites. Let's hope for better in the next installment and hopefully, that will come soon.

Joanne Brady is the sheriff of Cochise County, Arizona, a mother and a wife, but daily she struggles to maintain a balance between her three major roles. One long weekend stretches the resources of her department to the limit. Alfred and Martha Beasley have a pleasant picnic near Huachuca Mountain; afterward they calmly speed on the mountain until the vehicle goes over the side. It was a double suicide as Alfred feared he had Alzheimer's and neither he nor his wife could live with that sentence.

Then after a violent storm, two garbage bags tied together are found in the desert and inside are the skeletal remains of mentally impaired Wanda Mappin who lived in a group home run by Flannigan Foundation. Wanda complained to her mother before she died that her friend Wayne was missing. The Foundation listed her as missing soon after she disappeared, but the Foundation waited two months to report it.

The Beasley's two adult daughters have not spoken to each other for decades. They come to town to deal with the deaths of their parents and the estate. They end up in jail for drunk and disorderly conduct. When they are released one of them has a psychotic break down and holds her sister hostage, but soon after the other too goes over the edge. A woman kills an intruder in her home thinking he is her boyfriend when it is a stranger linked to another case while an elderly person dies in a trailer fire while his daughter and children survive. Joanne has had a long weekend.

This is just the tip of the iceberg as there are more crimes and deaths and plenty of people with information who fail to step forward. Although somewhat overwhelming in a novel with so much big and small happening, realism hits home as J.A. Jance juggles several subplots that reflect life as a county sheriff. DAMAGE CONTROL is impossible to put down whodunit as Joanne Brady believes she can do it all, but would not mind a short respite to recharge the batteries; but if none come so be it she will do all her roles well.

Harriet Klausner

I find myself looking for the characters and places as I travel Sheriff Brady's jurisdiction. It is impossible to read J.A.Jances books and not begin thinking of them as almost real. The problems and trials are those we all face or have faced- our good sheriff in book after book is very human in her resolutions of problems. This book like the others in the series is a superb example of a well written mystery book. I can recommend this book without reservation , you will enjoy every page.

I own all of Jance's books, and Joanna Brady is my favorite character. As such, I'm always thrilled when a new volume of the series comes out. This one is very good - I blazed through it from cover to cover in one Sunday. There have been a couple hangers in Jance's writing lately, where all her characters seemed to be permanently high on moralin and oozing ethics and common-good at every opportunity. Not so in this book, Jance is back to what she does best, writing a fast paced plot with unexpected twists and littered with protagonists who finally again are allowed to lead a less-than-perfect (and hence credible) "life". The story is actually more than one story, but nicely intertwined and even what appears to be a sub-sub-plot ends up being linked to the opening gambit in the end. About the only complaint that I have - and which kept me from awarding 5 stars - is that Jance's newer books are littered with too many bodies. It appears to me that whenever a lull of ideas sneaks into the plot, Jance responds with slicing chopping poisoning shooting quartering hanging yet another protagonist. This sure puts the defibrillator on the story and jolts it back to life, but the trick nevertheless tends to get a tiny bit stale over time.

I've been reading J. A. Jance's Joanna Brady mysteries since the first one, Desert Heat, was published back in 1993. The earlier books were all great reads, but frankly, I'd become a little bored with the series due to the mostly predictable behavior of its principal characters until I read the latest book, Damage Control. This book has a lot going on, holds your interest, and most importantly to me, it feels real for a change. In fact, several scenes brought tears to my eyes, which is unusual for me. Not a great book, but a very good one indeed.

This book is vintage J.A. Jance. She does a masterful job of interweaving the personal and professional lives of her heroine, Sheriff Joanna Brady, while giving her fans a great read. On the professional side, Joanna is faced with the apparent murder/suicide of an elderly couple, a man who dies in a mobile home fire, and the discovery of a decomposed body found in a trash bag. Personally, Joanna struggles to balance her personal life, which involves her husband Butch trying to promote his new book while tending to their young son and her teenaged daughter. During the course of this book, Joanna and Butch have to work out several compromises between the demands of their jobs and those of their growing family. Their struggles are very realistic in the light of today's two-career families, and the family issues are handled in a positive and practical fashion. This is one of the best books in a very good series.