16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Reading About Weddings Can Be Murder, June 19, 2008
This review is from: Just Murdered (Dead-End Job Mystery) (Mass Market Paperback)
This is the first book I have read in this series. I thought I'd really like it, but I was extremely disappointed. It was dull and predictable. The vocabulary seemed odd like a person from other than the gold coast was speaking. Either the vocabualry was overworked or the author is British. It just didn't fit with the setting.
After reading other reviews, I am not giving up on the series, (I have already bought 3 others)Maybe the rest will be better.
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15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Silly, June 7, 2005
This review is from: Just Murdered (Dead-End Job Mystery) (Mass Market Paperback)
I usually enjoy this series a lot, but this installment just didn't do it for me.
Helen just took up with Phil in the last book, and already they're declaring their undying love for each other. Not once, but twice, Helen jumps to the wrong conclusion about Phil and his ex-wife and comes off as near-suicidal. It was just way too much too soon after the start of the romance.
I also thought the plot was weak. Mother of the bride deaths are being done way too much lately. The characters come across as one-dimensional and unlikeable. Add that to a thin plot and this just wasn't as enjoyable as other installments of the series.
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18 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Whose Wedding Is This?, June 30, 2005
This review is from: Just Murdered (Dead-End Job Mystery) (Mass Market Paperback)
Helen Hawthorne's new job is at Millicent's Bridal Salon. Somehow Helen thought a Bridal Salon would be a nice place to work. Happy brides wanting to make their special day perfect.
That was before she met a running stream of Bridezilla's and their mothers. The worse is Desiree Shenrad, a true mouse and her tyrannical, rich and obnoxious mother Kiki, who not only makes all the decisions on the wedding, but seems to have even picked out the groom.
It doesn't seem that big of a loss when Kiki winds up dead, stuffed in a closet at the wedding. Except that Helen's fingerprints seem to be all over the place and the police are giving her a second look.
To prevent them from finding out who she is, Helen decides to investigate and discover who really wanted this mother-of-the-bride dead. Her ex-husband, her daughter, the prospective son-in-law, an actor that she wouldn't let take a part because it was degrading? What about Millicent, the bridal shop owner who had threatened her, or the chauffeur who thought she was leaving him a lot of money in her will, but was actually getting ready to dump him.
With this list of suspects, Helen hoped it wouldn't take too long to find the killer, or the police may just uncover her hidden identity first.
Highlights:
The mystery was pretty good, a lot of suspects and Helen does actually investigate and finds clues which lead her to the killer.
The romance of Margery - Helen's landlady and new resident Warren who teaches dancing.
We didn't have to read the long drawn out version of why Helen's hiding.
Lowlights.
This series has been improving since the first book which I disliked, but this one is a set-back.
The mystery was ok, but not only is Kiki such a horrible person that you don't care that she gets killed, you also don't care about anyone else. I hated them all.
Phil - formerly Phil the pothead whose true identity came out in the last book and is now Helen's new boyfriend. I think Phil was a better character when he was unseen and only talked about.
Why do so many people in these books always have to be ridiculously polite, Phil letting his ex-wife, who is trying to get him back move in with him while she's in town, even though he knows it upsets Helen and he can hear her crying about it. "She doesn't have anywhere to stay, so I have to let her stay here." In real life you'd tell her to get a hotel and maybe, just maybe pay for a few nights there if she's pleading poverty.
I'm hoping that the next book will be better.
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