This X Marks an Enjoyable Story
While I wasn’t reading the Kinsey Millhone series before the twenty-fourth book in the series came out, I was aware of it, and I paid attention to each title to see what word author Sue Grafton would pair with that letter of the alphabet. Naturally, I was wondering what she would do for “X.” Turned, out, she let it stand alone, with works well for a mystery series, right?
As any fan of the series will tell you, Kinsey Millhone is a PI in Santa Teresa, a very thinly disguised Santa Barbara, California. While the books were written over roughly 35 years, Kinsey stays firmly in the 1980’s, when the first book in the series came out. For this book, we are in early 1989.
Before I get to my teaser, I do want to issue a warning: don’t read the official teaser for the book. Usually, when there is a book in a series I regularly read, I don’t bother with it, and I’m very glad I went into this book blind. The official teaser has some major spoilers, and I would have found this book much less enjoyable waiting for Kinsey to figure out what we’d been told.
Really, there are three stories in this book intertwined to keep Kinsey busy. In the first, Kinsey and her landlord, Henry, get a new neighbor, who seems adept at manipulating Henry and, by extension, Kinsey. Meanwhile, Kinsey makes an interesting discovery while digging through the papers of a late PI for the man’s widow who is facing an IRS audit. Finally, Kinsey is asked to track down a recent parolee by the man’s birth mother.
I know, when you look at it, this doesn’t look like much, does it? None of these stories are enough to carry a book on their own, but somehow, combined in this book, they work. Or at least, they did for me. I got caught up in the story as in unfolded, and the further we got into the book, the more I wanted to know how things were going to be resolved. While two of the three stories were resolved well, I felt the resolution to the third was a little weak and rushed. And, honestly, for some of the foreshadowing the Kinsey did early on, I don’t feel like any of these quite worked their way up to the level of danger that the series has had before.
But that’s a minor complaint overall. It was a pleasant book with plenty to keep me engaged.
Part of that is Kinsey herself. I love spending time with her, which is no surprise if I am on book twenty-four in the series. We got some scenes with the series regulars as well as appearances from some of the recurring players as well. The new characters were well-drawn enough to make me care about the outcome if the stories.
Naturally, being a PI novel, there is more language and a tad more violence than in the cozies I typically read, although in this book it’s mostly four letter words. Even those are kept to a minimum.
Again, I listened to the audio book. I’ve gotten completely used to Judy Kaye’s narration at this point, and enjoy letting her pull me further into the book.
“X” isn’t the strongest book in the series, but it is
still enjoyable. If you sit back and
enjoy the ride, you’ll find yourself caught up in the story before too long.
