#beverly barton

“What She Doesn’t Know” by Beverly Barton is the story of a young woman that returns home and is once again faced with the death of her mom, aunt, and a farmhand. Jolie startled the murderer as a child and was almost killed herself. When she returns due to her father’s passing and to hear the reading of the will the killer starts to get nervous. Or rather, a certain cohort gets agitated when Jolie tries to remember what happened.

Along the way Jolie struggles with the relationship, or lack there of, she shared with her father. She felt abandoned and forgotten after her father sent her away for her own safety without fully explaining the situation. Jolie is now left to decide whether the past is worth moving on from or if the key to continuing on is best done holding on to the hurt. There is also the man that pulls on her heart strings and ends up only complicating the situation more. At the end of the day, the murderer did not turn out to be the culprit I had in mind. Barton had me convinced that it was another character right up until the reveal when I still wanted to argue. 

This book holds many twists and turns that kept me fully engulfed the entire way through. In a way it turned out to be more of a love story that was wrapped up in an unsolved murder. The real focus was on our main character learning how to trust and rely on those around her. Learning that you cannot judge someone’s entire life by one choice or indiscretion; and that what we want in life isn’t always found in the most tidy of packages. 

Review: Most Likely to Die

    Synopsis:

“New York Times” bestselling authors Lisa Jackson, Beverly Barton, and Wendy Corsi Staub join forces to create a thrilling novel about love, revenge, and the dark secrets three women hold to a terrifying murder. . .

A Killer Who Gets Away With Murder Once. . . It’s been twenty years since the night Jake Marcott was brutally murdered at St. Elizabeth High School. It’s a night that…

Even as I am writing this post, I’m going back and forth on how to rate this book. My gut is telling me to assign a low score, because I didn’t enjoy the book, but on the other hand I also finished the whole thing, so how bad could it really have been?

It… was pretty bad. Part of it is my own fault; this book is actually the tenth in the Griffin Powell series by Barton, although it was the first of Barton’s many books that I’ve read. Yes, you read that right: I read the tenth book in a series as my jumping-off point with an author. In my defense, I had no idea! What happened?! I’m so glad you asked…

I was on vacation and out of things to read when I discovered the hotel had a small collection of books to borrow. Based on the quality and condition of most of these books is that they are cast-offs or rejects from past travelers, but beggars can’t be choosers so I blithely selected some reading material and went back to sitting by the pool.

Silent Killer seemed like it was going to be a quick read, and if I didn’t finish it before I had to return it the the desk I wouldn’t be too disappointed. Nowhere on the book was there any indication that it was a sequel or otherwise related to a series. It didn’t say so on the cover or the spine:

Nor does the back blurb imply that there is any prior knowledge about the story needed:

Then, in two separate lists of books by Barton, neither list mentions that all these books are in the same series!

Lo and behold, within the first several chapters I was confused by what was happening, so I looked up the book on GoodReads, and figured out what the issue was. But, while every few chapters would be confusing and meaningless to me, the overall story arc was unrelated to the series, so I kept reading (plus, I was in a literature desert, so what choice did I have).

Even with my exasperation about the book being a series, I would have still scored this book much higher, except it really was terrible. For an author who had previously written at least 9 other books, the dialogue and storytelling felt extraordinarily amateur. Characters are constantly telling the reader things, rather than the facts of the story emerging more naturally. Another thing that really decreased the score was the fact that the depiction of law enforcement was laughable; I am not now, nor never have been any sort of police officer, but I am pretty sure that it takes some kind of training and actual skill, a fact that Barton doesn’t seem to be aware of. Within 3 days on the job our “hero” Jack, who got the job because he’s BFFs with the chief and needed employment, not because he’s qualified, has already taken over an investigation and started telling other officers how to do their jobs. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg; once the killer really starts doubling down on the murder-spree the police become less and less professional… and yet they still sort-of manage to catch the killer (spolier?). I mean, the ambiguously aged teenage soon of the heroine figures it out just as fast. (About that: the kid is sometimes 15, sometimes 16, sometimes almost 17, and sometimes somehow born 14 years ago? And the story only takes place over a couple of days or weeks, so it’s notlike he’s having birthdays all over the place. It’s confusing). There’s also enough POV characters to make your head spin.

Besides the clunky writing, there are also 11 pastors/rabbis/priests in this story. ELEVEN. I had to get out a notebook and count them in order to keep them straight. Living in the Bible Belt I’m no stranger to having a town with a high-density of churches, but the town was made out to be the kind of small where you know everyone’s grandparent’s intimate business, so I don’t think it would be able to support more than three or four churches- certainly not 8 or 9+.

Perhaps the one redeeming quality is that the killer was kind of unsuspected? I mean, I had it figured out before the reveal, but it was my second guess and I wasn’t sure until two thirds of the way through, so at least it wasn’t obvious from the get-go, and it wasn’t the even worse sin of someone totally out of left field. The final confrontation was corny and implausible, but I got caught up in it enough as I was reading so after everything else it didn’t bother me much.

For all the faults, this was an ok book for mindless reading by the pool, but what really set me off came at the very end, when I got to this page:

That’s right! After reading the whole thing, suddenly Barton is desperate for you to know that there’s a whole series! (And you thought  was done with the rant about this, didn’t you?)

Anyway, this book didn’t do it for me, but if you’ve read the first 9 Griffen Powell books, then maybe you’ll like it more?

Just The Way You Are by Beverly Barton

Just the Way You Are by Beverly Barton Release date: Jan 27th, 2015 Publisher: Zebra Books

Synopsis

The South sizzles in New York Times bestselling author Beverly Barton’s sultry tale of a woman torn between two brothers…

Mary Beth Caine has always been the good girl in her small Mississippi town. But when a big, protective, shamelessly sexy stranger offers to console her on the night of her…

Beverly Barton Presents Just the Way You Are

Just the Way You Are by Beverly Barton Release date: Jan 27th, 2015 Publisher: Zebra Books

Synopsis

The South sizzles in New York Times bestselling author Beverly Barton’s sultry tale of a woman torn between two brothers…

Mary Beth Caine has always been the good girl in her small Mississippi town. But when a big, protective, shamelessly sexy stranger offers to console her on the night of her…

Bismillahirahmanirahim....

Buku ini adalah buku pertama yang saya beli di tahun 2015, sebenarnya ga niat sih, cuman karena dapat SMS dari toko buku TogaMas Yogyakarta yang bikin diskon 30% di awal tahun dari tanggal 2-3 Januari, untuk semua buku. Woohoo!! :D Waktu itu saya galau (sailah) antara mau beli buku Lady in the Glass, karya Laurentia Mira atau Don't Cry karyanya Beverly Barton. Padahal Lady in the Glass itu adalah novel hukum pertama di Indonesia, latar belakang ceritanya cukup menarik perhatian saya, dan saya sudah membayangkan bahwa ceritanya akan seperti novel The Confession-nya John Grisham (maklum cuma ini pembandingannya, novel tentang hukum baru buku ini yang saya baca :p ) Setelah melewati keputusan yang rumit, akhirnya pilihan dijatuhkan ke buku Don't Cry karya Beverly Barton

Don't Cry (Jangan Teteskan Air Mata), Beverly Barton (publiksi pertama 1 Januari 2010), Dastan Books

Tebal    : 528 halaman

Terbit    : Mei 2014

Cover   : Softcover

ISBN     : 978-602-247-164-6

Buku ini menceritakan, tentang pembunuhan dan yang menjadi korbannya semuanya adalah wanita yang memiliki ciri-ciri serupa, yaitu : sekitar umur 25an, memiliki rambut hitam, dan atraktif. Hal yang paling identik dari setiap korban adalah, mereka diletakkan di atas kursi goyang sambil memeluk (yang awalnya dikira) sebuah boneka. Tetapi hal yang mengejutkan terjadi, fakta membuktikan bahwa yang dipeluk bukanlah sebuah boneka, melainkan tulang-belulang dari seorang bayi. Tak berapa lama kemudian, polisi setempat mengetahui bahwa bayi-bayi tersebut adalah korban penculikan baby blues 25 tahun yang lalu!

I rarely read Beverly Barton (not by choice mind you), and the handful that I’ve read have been very impressive. Her latest release, “I’ll Be Watching You”, is another brilliant thriller with a combination of passion, evil and suspense.

Reed Conwayreturns to Spring Creek, AL on parole, after being imprisoned for the murder of his stepfather. His main goal is to stay out of trouble and try to find…