Customer Reviews

Deadly Sanctuary (Kendall O'Dell Mystery series)

5 star:		(57)
4 star:		(44)
3 star:		(12)
2 star:		(9)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

Enjoy Southwest lore? Love a mystery? Recently I read a mystery by a comparatively new and very promising author who resides in the Phoenix area, Sylvia Nobel, which combines both features. Deadly Sanctuary is a fast paced mystery which takes place here in Arizona. The heroine, Kendall O'Dell, takes a new job at a small AZ newspaper and stumbles into an evil conspiracy involving the death of two teen-aged girls. Sylvia Nobel's tale of mystery will hold your attention from beginning to end. Her style is similar to Tony Hillerman. Try it--you'll like it!

I'm not usually a big mystery buff, but I thought I'd give this one a try and I'm glad I did. Now I understand what the phrase "compulsive page turner" means -- I just couldn't stop reading! It's such an imaginative plot, with so many twists and turns I can't imagine many readers figuring it out ahead of time. A definite must read.

First of all, not sure how this book was ever tagged "Christian" as a reviewer mentions. Maybe the word "Sanctuary" kicked off some kind of automatic labeling? This is not a Christian book but also doesn't hold itself out to be one.

Story is a typical big city girl goes to tiny town for one reason or another (man trouble, money trouble, or in this case, both) and stirs up the locals. First, with so many references to the heroine (Kendall) having such limited funds and the newspaper she works for being on the brink of financial disaster, where does Kendall get the money to do things like pay several hundred dollars to a source? The book needs a good editor.

Characters: pretty one dimensional - handsome, rich but obviously slimy guy tries to charm Kendall (guess the author was trying to create conflict?), then there's the typical brooding-cowboy-who-clearly-has-a-secret character; small town sherriff as bad guy, etc. All quite predictable and boring.

What killed the book for me: I may have given the book three stars except for one thing. The author has Kendall's coworker, Ginger, speaking the most excrutiating dialect since she's supposed to be from Texas. Almost every sentence out of Ginger's mouth is the author's attempt at a folksy saying and Ginger says "y'all" every other word. A word to aspiring authors who studied dialogue in a writing class and want to be the next William Faulkner: PLEASE, PLEASE, DON'T TRY TO WRITE DIALECT! Sit on your hands, have someone hide your laptop, call your writing sponsor! Written dialect is extremely difficult to get right, and most of the time all it does is make readers cringe in embarrassment for the author.

This book was written in 1998 - I'd be interested to see if the author has improved since then since other reviewers seem to be big fans of her work. This was a cute mystery that needs better writing - not even close to "gripping" or "kept me up all night" but okay for a free book.

Oh yeah - the Kindle version has issues - had a few sections where a prior page or two repeated themselves, but that's not the author's fault.

The main character, Kendall O'Dell, is someone everyone can relate to as she tries to untangle a murder mystery in her new hometown. She's attracted to two very different men--which one will win her favor? Loved the Arizona setting--very descriptive.

It was free on our nook last week so I figured I'd give it a try. Basic plot wasn't bad, but the writing was very amateurish. Read like it was written by a bored housewife who was dragged to AZ by her husbands job, read a "how to write mysteries" book and decided to give it a go. Not much of a "thinker" the narrator spells everything out for the reader. The author may live in AZ, but must not have lived here long or not lived outside of a gated McMansion type of area because the little details she includes are just wrong. Snowbirds sticking around until June? Heck they're gone by April. Closing doors and windows to turn on a swamp cooler? That's the opposite of how you use a swamper - they need windows or doors open to circulate air. Just a lot of that kind of little thing that tries to add authenticity but is off base. Maybe the author has gotten better or found an editor...but I'm not in a hurry to try anything else of hers unless it's free again.

I'm glad this was a Kindle freebie, or I'd have been unhappy at wasting my money. I love mysteries and read many of them, but felt that this one didn't offer much. Before I'd read 20% of the book, I'd figured out the "big secret" that was supposed to be the great surprise ending. I found Kendall O'Dell to be unbelievably naive for a woman of nearly 30 who'd been working as a journalist in a large city. For example, she decides that information about one character's deep financial troubles can't be true because the person lives large and has a public image of extreme wealth. Really? Despite all the events of the past decade, she takes that at face value? Apparently she only works for newspapers--she never reads them. There's also a lot of very repetitive wording that I found distracting and grating. (Someone needs to buy this author a phrase to use in place of "I couldn't help but . . . ." Not only was it over-used, but it's technically a double-negative and shouldn't be used at all.)

I did enjoy the last few chapters when the book reached its climax and everything let loose, but it was a struggle to stick with it until I got to that point. I'm going to pass on Ms. O'Dell's other exploits.

The story line was interesting but I gave up soon because I was tired of the bad language. Good writers often ruin a good story by adding offensive language. Such words are just plain bad manners and unfortunately this book is an example of a good book spoiled by such language.

I was completely caught up in the story from the very first page. Being a resident of Az, I enjoyed the descriptive prose of various locations, and appreciated reading a book based on a Southwest setting. The story line was easy to follow, yet easy to remember if you left the book and came back a day or two later. The characters were intriguing, realistic and felt like someone you already know. I throughly enjoyed Deadly Sanctuary. I was hooked from the first page to the last!

I think that the target audience for this novel is teenage girls, which I didn't realized when I bought it. If you're a man, you probably won't like this one.

I just finished the Nook version of this book.

I probably will not buy additional titles by this author.

Here are some of my observations on this book:

Good Stuff:

Pretty good characters, stronger than many seasoned writers have created.

Good setting ... you really feel the heat of the Southwest setting.

Interesting plot. I enjoyed the storyline of new reporter investigating a missing, possibly murdered former reporter ... the different angles of possible law enforcement involvement and coverups, suspicious activities at the mental institution, other mysterious deaths that may or may not be related. It's a well-spun tale.

Bad Stuff:

The writing. It just isn't good. Anywhere. Narrative is frequently dull. Dialog is frequently silly ... and the y'alls and other dialectical eccentricities of Ginger are just bad. Not realistic, and painful.

Conclusion

For free, you may enjoy this book simply for the strength of the plot and the "easy read" nature of it. If you are really into good writing though, you may want to pass.