Customer Reviews

The Groaning Board

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One of the best parts of this series has usually been the realization of Leslie's emotional growth and personal assertiveness. Yet I felt this book portrays her regression into a teenybopper mindset who easily hops into a relationship with a man with definitely sinister connections. That's not thrilling: that's juvenile. Easily,she tosses over the "love of her life" and, as she did with a former "Power-Trip Lover," rubs Silvestri's nose in it. Leslie's belated visitation (after how many years?) and "oh, my goodness" description of his apartment was just a little too difficult to believe considering that Silvestri does possess the couth to be "at home" in an abode of Leslie's stylish taste, and because of the fact that he is enough of an age that has relinquished the "Early Dorm Room" type of decorating. By now, it's simply a far reach, given his stage in life, that the place would be that bad. Plus, the couple's main differences, after all, don't present as intellectual or societal ones (they communicate verbally at the same level and he doesn't eat with his feet), but on the difficulty of blending their occupational worlds, which is a fairly common standoff in most relationships as evidenced when holiday parties cause the stress of crossing territories. So psychologically, given their extremely strong chemistry and depth of feeling evidenced in prior books, this "tossing away" of the relationship makes no sense at this time. In reading the book, the incongruity of the couple's feelings versus efforts somehow overrode the gist of the book and had a disconcerting effect. Suddenly Les seems a mess and looked like some tasteless relationship-randomizer instead of continuing along the maturation process. But, at least the series was continued with the writing of this book and, hopefully, won't be the last in an otherwise terrific series which has been a brainy and entertaining reading adventure.

Disappointing ... although still a page turner, I found The Groaning Board to be less than expected. While, fortunately, Smith was less in evidence, unfortunately so was Carlos, the wittiest of the bunch. Another breakup with Silvestri and within minutes (or so it seems), Wetzon has found someone new, not necessarily an improvement. Another sleek "sensitive", rich lawyer without the moodiness of Silvestri but also without much of an interesting character. Let's hope the next time out will see Meyers back to the level she attained previously.

Annette Meyers is a longtime New Yorker and was a former assistant to Broadway producer Hal Prince and vice president at a headhunting firm, and all three professions provide the backdrop and spice to "The Groaning Board," her seventh mystery featuring Xenia Smith and Leslie Wetzon.

This is one of those mysteries where the secondary stories are just as entertaining as the whodunit. Wetzon, the former dancer partnered with Smith in their growing headhunting firm, acts as her own Watson as she investigates the death of one of the characters associated with The Groaning Board, the gourmet store partway through its 15 minutes of fame. Its principals are fighting over an initial public offering that can stand to make them millions, and the sharks are circling over this potential gold mine.

Meyers is a writer with the cheek to install a solitary Fabio in the background of a restaurant scene and razz at his declining celebrity, as well as to insert a quotation from one of the book's characters into the fronts piece. She's talented enough to create Xenia Smith, a barracuda whose cheerful duplicity and unabashed greed manages to retain the affection of both Wetzon and the reader.

She also does for New York City in detective fiction what Woody Allen does in film: showing us the glamor and the attractions of the city that never sleeps. To Meyers, New York is a nice place to visit and you would want to live there, and it is be a measure of the city's place in fiction that this attitude comes across as fresh, almost revolutionary.

.....Xenia Smith and Leslie Wezon are partners in a Wall Street executive search firm. They go to the Groaning Board, a popular food store, to arrange catering for an upcoming dinner party they plan to host. At the establishment, Smith and Wezon meet the co-owners, A.T. Barron and Micklynn Devora, a squabbling team whose seemingly irreconcilable differences appears to be dooming the lucrative business. Not much after that visit, people are being poisoned by food made at the Groaning Board. At least one person, a former girl friend of Leslie's lover, has died. This incident leads to the break up of Leslie's relationship. .......When the evidence points towards Micklynn as the prime suspect, she hires Leslie, who begins to investigate the poisoning. Leslie soon finds her own life in jeopardy as someone obviously does no want her to uncover the truth behind the food poisoning incidents. Leslie may learn that it is safer on Wall Street than it is on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, but that lesson may have been learned too late. .....THE GROANING BOARD is a gourmet's delight due to its brilliant lead characters and their interactions and reactions to each other and to other players. The business world is an intriguingly insightful backdrop to a well written who-done-it. All seven Smith and Wezon novels are worth reading by fans who enjoy intricately woven characters (think DNA double helix) and a glimpse inside the Manhattan business world. ..... Harriet Klausner