Customer Reviews

The End of the Road: A Maxie and Stretch Mystery (Center Point Premier Mystery (Large Print))

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(12)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Maxie McNabb is an retired widow who lives in beautiful Homer, Alaska with her miniature dachshund Stretch. Maxie is known to travel the US in her RV when the weather gets too cold for her in Alaska. She is always accompanied by her faithful companion Stretch.

One day while walking her dog in the now deserted tourist town, she comes across a lone tourist, a friendly man, who is staying at a local motel. Maxie offers to give the man, John Walker, a ride back to his motel, and invites him to dinner to meet some of her friends --he accepts. The following day John Walker is found dead in his motel room, a suspected suicide. Maxie's name is found in the man's room and so the police come to question her. Everyone soon learns that the man carried no ID and is not who he claimed to be. Everyone seems to be at a loss as to why this man was in Alaska alone, and why he is now dead?

MY THOUGHTS - The End of the Road is the fourth book in the Maxie and Stretch series. It is not necessary to read the other books first, but in this case I would recommend it. I liked the other books in this series, by Sue Henry, but this one left me scratching my head. Why? How many elderly women would befriend a complete stranger and give him a ride, and invite him to dinner? Even the resolution to this mystery was "over the top" and rushed. If you'd like to read a fun mystery by this author I'd recommend starting with her earlier books in this series: The Serpent's Trail or The Tooth of Time.

I just finished The End of the Road and I was very disappointed. The whole thing was just -- blah. Too many descriptions -- I got out of the car, closed the door, put the key in the lock, etc., etc. No excitement; no intrigue; just nothing. The ending was totally flat since there was no mystery to begin with. It felt like Alex and Jessie were thrown in just to fill some pages. The last couple of books weren't great, either, although this was the worst. I'll read one more; if it's not better I'm going to give up on Sue Henry. Sorry.

I was very disappointed. Seemed like all the writer did this time was write a daily journal of activities. The ending was thrown in as if it was a mystery. Wasn't even believable.

I am a big fan of Sue Henry's cozy mysteries. I love Maxie and Stretch...but where's the mystery in The End of the Road? No character development, no clues, nothing. An opportunity to include Alex and Jess into the solution of the "mystery" was missed within several pages of describing their dinner together. And while on the subject of describing things...most of the text was describing clothing, buildings, weather, useless info- - -just filler. I wondered if Ms. Henry had to meet a deadline therefore didn't have time to think about the actual plot or story. I hope the title of this novel isn't indicative of the author's career move.

I was soooo looking forward to the release of this book because Homer is my hometown (although I live in the lower 48 right now). I have read ALL of Sue Henry's books, but something has happened to her!! I can't believe her editor let this book pass. There was so much of her daily diary, and hardly any pages dedicated to the mystery! She repeated so many paragraphs, and/or descriptions of feelings, and places. It was soooo boring, even though I kept looking forward to hearing her descriptions of the place that I love.....at the same time I was sooooo disappointed that there wasn't more of a mystery story!! It was a waste of my money!!

I see that my rating is much higher than most other reviewers, but perhaps the reason I liked it so much is that I am in Maxie's age group and I enjoy the same sorts of things that she does.

In previous Maxie and Stretch books, Maxie has been traveling in other parts of the US, and I enjoyed the fact that she stayed in Alaska this time. The background of Homer, a small Alaskan town, suits this laid-back mystery in which she meets a somewhat mysterious stranger whom she befriends. The plot thickens when the man comes to an untimely end and Maxie uses all of her investigative powers to uncover what really happened to him.

One of my favorite mysteries of all is Sue Henry's TERMINATION DUST, so I have been looking forward to this new book by a favorite author. THE END OF THE ROAD is very well written with excellent characters. Unfortunately, they are given no where to go. Even after one of the characters has been found dead, the death is written off to natural causes, with not even the smallest hint that he might have been murdered. This is the way things stay until the very last few chapters. There is no trail of clues to follow, until the very end when the body count abruptly goes up. And, as a person who has owned a dachshund, the last two chapters are totally implausible. In reality, Stretch would have sniffed out the murderer, and never stopped barking until that person had been arrested and hauled away. Which leaves me with nothing to say other than this book is criminally boring. Sue Henry has written some fabulous mysteries. Unfortunately, this isn't one of them.

I loved most of this book. Maxie is the kind of person I would love to have as a neighbor. And being a dog lover, I enjoy the role Stretch always plays in her stories. I liked the day to day telling of Maxie and Stretch and their life and enjoyed the book till the last few pages. The ending was sloppy, in my opinion. It left some things 'untied'. How did the woman stay hidden in the house without THE DOG alerting Maxie? My Yorkies would have sounded the alarm. Maxie wonders how the police will get into her house to rescue her cuz everything is locked up tight. All of a sudden, there they are with no explanation. It would have been nice to have a few more pages to the story to finish it better.

I have all the Sun Henry books, including the Maxie series - this was not up to the same standards as the previous stories, sad to say. Also, I ordered this book twice, trying to get the missing info on page 99 - both times, the paperback that was sent to me had half the page's story missing! And on the following page (pg. 100), the story was in mid-stride, so I definitely know that there was a part missing . . . I gave up on getting a complete book - too bad!

There are several inconsistencies in this book where the reader will automatically ask, "What?"
The first is when one of the characters tells Maxie, "He had walked away from everything and everyone in his life when his wife died." Yet, two pages later, Maxie asks the character:"He was married?"

The second, and more glaring inconsistency, is that although the killer was hidden in the house during the time that Maxie and a policeman were discussing a plan to catch her, and although she heard everything else they planned, the killer somehow managed NOT to hear the part about Maxie putting a cell phone in her pocket to call the police. Since the cell phone played a major part in the capture/end, this really was sloppy writing and/or editing.