[YMM]≫ [PDF] Free The Dead Cat Bounce A Home Repair is Homicide Mystery Sarah Graves 9780553578577 Books

The Dead Cat Bounce A Home Repair is Homicide Mystery Sarah Graves 9780553578577 Books

Download As PDF : The Dead Cat Bounce A Home Repair is Homicide Mystery Sarah Graves 9780553578577 Books

The Dead Cat Bounce A Home Repair is Homicide Mystery Sarah Graves 9780553578577 Books

This will probably be my last "cozy mystery," so I will indulge myself with a lengthy diatribe on the topic.

I grew up with Agatha Christie and Lilian Jackson Braun, so I thought the cozy mystery genre would be a great fit. Unfortunately, this book, and similar series that I've tried, uses a lazy "write by numbers" formula that leads to material that is not just unremarkable, but substandard. In the books written to fit this niche, the heroine is a mature woman who is still attractive, and is restarting her life again after a divorce and/or career change and/or relocating. She is well liked, and an observer of both human nature and of some quaint and picturesque place. She has in her new life, or meets, some idealized version of a hyper-masculine man who is everything she found lacking in her past relationship. He is the strong, yet sensitive man that every movie from the first half of the 20th century has assured us should be every woman's fantasy. The protagonist also needs a loveable pet, and a vocation that is the theme of a basic cable channel i.e. cooking, home-repair, animals ect. Her town needs to be populated with a series of two-dimensional, forgettable, and generally oblivious characters that could be lifted directly from any 80's television crime-drama that needed its audience to know if someone was a good guy or bad guy within the first 5 minutes of an episode. The townspeople are also required to know the complete history of every person in town, know everything that happens in the town within an hour, and be willing to share this information at any given moment.

All of these standard 'fill in the blank' elements wouldn't mean that the book had to be bad, but the real problem is in the execution. The writer seems to operate under the assumption that if they provide the basic format, they don't need to worry about writing well. Thus, we end up with the literary equivalent to romance novels, but without the titillating features that at least make romance novels appealing to some. Graves did try slightly in that vein with this laughable line: I wanted to drape myself on him as if I were ivy and he were a trellis.

I almost stopped reading this particular "cozy mystery" immediately when the writer went on some awkward tangent extolling the virtues of guns in small towns and then trying to sell their use as a therapeutic activity , but I found the liberal use of SAT words and the detailed financial world insights slightly intriguing. After a while, I became curious which of the never-ending parade of Cabot Cove style characters that were impossible to keep track of was actually the perpetrator since the main suspect that the protagonist was so persistently and single-mindedly focused on (to the point of obsession) got so much attention that there was no way it could have been her. In the end, it wasn't worth the wait, and the only real pleasure I derived from the book was being able to write my review knowing I finished the entire thing.


Tags : The Dead Cat Bounce: A Home Repair is Homicide Mystery [Sarah Graves] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. <b>dead cat bounce</b> n.</i> Stock market jargon for a small, temporary rise in a stock's trading price after a sharp drop. Since she bought her rambling old fixer-upper of a house,Sarah Graves,The Dead Cat Bounce: A Home Repair is Homicide Mystery,Bantam,055357857X,Mystery & Detective - Women Sleuths,Detective and mystery stories,Dwellings;Maine;Eastport;Maintenance and repair;Fiction.,Maine - Fiction,Murder;Investigation;Maine;Eastport;Fiction.,Tiptree, Jacobia (Fictitious character);Fiction.,Dwellings,Eastport,FICTION Mystery & Detective Traditional,FICTION Mystery & Detective Women Sleuths,FICTION Thrillers Suspense,Fiction,Fiction - Mystery Detective,Fiction-Mystery & Detective,General Adult,Investigation,MASS MARKET,Maine,Maintenance and repair,Modern & contemporary fiction (post c 1945),Modern fiction,Murder,MysterySuspense,Tiptree, Jacobia (Fictitious character),mystery; maine; cozy mystery; cozy; home repair; home repair is homicide; thrillers; mystery books; crime; mystery suspense; crime books; suspense books; suspense; crime fiction; thriller; mystery thriller; mystery and thrillers; mystery thrillers; mystery and suspense; crime novel; crime thriller; mystery fiction; mystery suspense thriller; thriller books; mystery novels; mystery thriller suspense; mystery and thriller; crime and mystery; mystery crime; thriller suspense; crime mystery thriller; suspense thriller,mystery;maine;cozy mystery;cozy;home repair;home repair is homicide;thrillers;mystery books;crime;mystery suspense;crime books;suspense books;suspense;crime fiction;thriller;mystery thriller;mystery and thrillers;mystery thrillers;mystery and suspense;crime novel;crime thriller;mystery fiction;mystery suspense thriller;thriller books;mystery novels;mystery thriller suspense;mystery and thriller;crime and mystery;mystery crime;thriller suspense;crime mystery thriller;suspense thriller,FICTION Mystery & Detective Traditional,FICTION Mystery & Detective Women Sleuths,FICTION Thrillers Suspense,Fiction - Mystery Detective,Dwellings,Eastport,Investigation,Maine,Maintenance and repair,Murder,Tiptree, Jacobia (Fictitious character),Fiction,MysterySuspense,Modern & contemporary fiction (post c 1945),Modern fiction

The Dead Cat Bounce A Home Repair is Homicide Mystery Sarah Graves 9780553578577 Books Reviews

Every thing to like and nothing to dislike about this excellent book. The plot was extremely well crafted and the characters were diverse and knowable. There were many to cheer for and others worthy of boos and hisses. Those of us familiar with Maine will be able to smell the salty air and hear the pounding waves. Those yet to enjoy the Maine experience will begin to do so now. Both groups have a treat in store for them. Highly recommended to those who appreciate the lack of explicit sex and foul language.
The first of the series and published about 20 years ago the book still holds up well. However there were a surprising number of typos for a book that has been out that long and that was first a print version. I picked this up while it was on sale for 99cents. Had been meaning to try the series for awhile. I enjoyed it and will read more.
It you like your mysteries quick this might not be for you as it moves fairly slowly and gives elaborate detail on some aspects of the primary characters life. If you like the detail oriented mysteries (I do) this one should hit the spot with you. Given it's age it is more in the vein of Murder She Wrote and lacks a significant technology plot line.
Originally published in 1998. Jacabite is a stockbroker investment advisor who gave it all up to move to a small town in Maine. She lives in an old house she is working on herself with her son Sam. She becomes involved in a murder when her friend comfesses to doing the killing. The characters are fun and the plot is good if predictable. It has some fifty chapters which gives a choppy feel and at over three hundred pages it is too long. Would have benefited from editing.
Jacobia Tiptree and her son, Sam, relocated to Maine after her divorce. She was a former stockbroker/money manager who decided to get out while she still had a stomach left. She bought an old Victorian house that needs lots of renovation. Her best friend in town is Ellie White.

Imagine Jacobia's surprise when she finds a dead body in her storage room with an ice pick in his head. Also imagine her surprise when later her friend Ellie confesses to the crime but makes remarks that let Jacobia's know that she wants her to find the real murderer. Finding the real murderer would be a lot easier if the people around her were not so good at keeping secrets.

I think that people interested in cozy mysteries would enjoy this book as well as those who enjoy books about Maine and the stock market. The characters were well drawn. The plot well paced.
If you are looking for a quick read this might not be the best book.

Jacobia and her son Sam move from New York where she was a high powered money manager and move to Eastport, Maine to get away from her overbearing ex-husband.
She buys a hundred year old fixer-upper and finds a body in her store room.
Her best friend Ellie confesses to the murder, and then wants Jake to expose the true killer because Ellie has made a promise.

The characters are so well developed that they jump off the pages. And I have never been to Maine but I felt the wind and rain and could smell the salty air.
The story is solid and well put together and I loved the fact that it was a true mystery with so many different suspects for the victim I was surprised at the end.

The only thing is the book is long, 56 or 57 chapters many of those for me could have been eliminated. I did get tired of reading about how exactly the repairs were done, one time is fine and I could have cared less about the victim and his FBI snitching over the years. Would have cut about 6 chapters.

Oh well, I enjoyed the book, a new series for me
This will probably be my last "cozy mystery," so I will indulge myself with a lengthy diatribe on the topic.

I grew up with Agatha Christie and Lilian Jackson Braun, so I thought the cozy mystery genre would be a great fit. Unfortunately, this book, and similar series that I've tried, uses a lazy "write by numbers" formula that leads to material that is not just unremarkable, but substandard. In the books written to fit this niche, the heroine is a mature woman who is still attractive, and is restarting her life again after a divorce and/or career change and/or relocating. She is well liked, and an observer of both human nature and of some quaint and picturesque place. She has in her new life, or meets, some idealized version of a hyper-masculine man who is everything she found lacking in her past relationship. He is the strong, yet sensitive man that every movie from the first half of the 20th century has assured us should be every woman's fantasy. The protagonist also needs a loveable pet, and a vocation that is the theme of a basic cable channel i.e. cooking, home-repair, animals ect. Her town needs to be populated with a series of two-dimensional, forgettable, and generally oblivious characters that could be lifted directly from any 80's television crime-drama that needed its audience to know if someone was a good guy or bad guy within the first 5 minutes of an episode. The townspeople are also required to know the complete history of every person in town, know everything that happens in the town within an hour, and be willing to share this information at any given moment.

All of these standard 'fill in the blank' elements wouldn't mean that the book had to be bad, but the real problem is in the execution. The writer seems to operate under the assumption that if they provide the basic format, they don't need to worry about writing well. Thus, we end up with the literary equivalent to romance novels, but without the titillating features that at least make romance novels appealing to some. Graves did try slightly in that vein with this laughable line I wanted to drape myself on him as if I were ivy and he were a trellis.

I almost stopped reading this particular "cozy mystery" immediately when the writer went on some awkward tangent extolling the virtues of guns in small towns and then trying to sell their use as a therapeutic activity , but I found the liberal use of SAT words and the detailed financial world insights slightly intriguing. After a while, I became curious which of the never-ending parade of Cabot Cove style characters that were impossible to keep track of was actually the perpetrator since the main suspect that the protagonist was so persistently and single-mindedly focused on (to the point of obsession) got so much attention that there was no way it could have been her. In the end, it wasn't worth the wait, and the only real pleasure I derived from the book was being able to write my review knowing I finished the entire thing.