novel

I think that Book Riot might be the death of me. I have to admit that "death by books" wouldn't necessarily be the worst way to go, though perhaps being pummeled to death by books might be. In this particular case, the article Five Female Characters Who Are Way More Awesome in Books started off with Katee Sackhoff as Victoria Moretti in Craig Johnson's Walt Longmire series. Katee Sackhoff. Starbuck. Sackhoff. In another tough-as-nails role? Yeah, sign me up.

And, holy moly, this book is fun. I came for the character and stayed for the wit. Johnson's writing style is as fun as Butcher's style in the Dresden series. Johnson also has the writing style of showing, not telling. I am a huge fan of this style, and consider it a sign of a better writer. The book is written in first person, and done well. We aren't privy to thoughts of the other characters, but are shown small details, sometimes in odd places, just as we all do in real life.

The book is set in Small Town, Wyoming. I haven't looked up the town or county to see if they actually exist. An unpleasant young-ish man is murdered. While the sheriff (who we follow in the first person) is solving his murder, one of the victim's fellow miscreants is also murdered. The sheriff is now taxed with protecting the victims' other fellow miscreants, while now solving two murders, which are linked. We learn of the sheriff's history in this book, the first of a currently-11 book series, which isn't unusual for a first book.

This book came up as a Book Riot book, just as I started reading Book Riot posts. I promptly bought a number of the books from that first list, but this book has been moving from to-do list (yellow card) to to-do list (another yellow card) to to-do list (give it to the PA to buy for me). In a fit of insomnia last night, I opened up my ebook copy and started reading. I had read R.L. Stine years ago when reading his books were age appropriate, though found them inferior to Christopher Pike's works (and learned JUST TODAY, that Christopher Pike is a pseudonym for Kevin Christopher McFadden, who used the Star Trek captain's name - always wondered about that one). Given the recommendation that Fear Street #9: Stepsister was the best of the Fear Street series, I read it. The "you'll read it in 35 minutes" was fairly accurate, though it took me more like an hour, reading on the jostling bus on a small screen.

THAT ALL SAID, it was okay. The style of writing was very, um, juvenile? The sentence structure was monotonous, the plot predictable and the twist anticipated. I found all of the characters unlovable, uninteresting, and, well, to be honest, unbelievable. The mom who doesn't want anything bad said about anyone or anything, to the point of disbelieving her daughter who's been almost killed twice? The stepdad who is such a wet noodle that we have no idea why the mom is even interested in him? The omniscient main character who is so determined to blame her stepsister for everything wrong that she is unable to function even slightly rationally? There were enough clues to understand where the author was going with the plot, fortunately.

If I were 10, I might have enjoyed this book. Related: I'm not 10. It was an okay book for the bus ride to work this morning. I'll move back to reading Madame Bovary for the ride home.