About
Reviews
Search
Submit
Home

Mystery Books for Sale

[ Home ]
[ About | Reviews | Search | Submit ]


  

PUPPET
by Joy Fielding
Pocket Star, November 2005
496 pages
$9.95
ISBN: 0743488016


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

Amanda Travis is a single lawyer living in an ocean front apartment in Florida. She always gets her clients off and prefers to date married men. Her past is something she avoids thinking about. After all, two divorces and family problems are not something that she wants to think about now that she is so very far away.

Out of the blue she gets a phone call from her first ex-husband Ben. Her mother apparently went crazy in a Toronto hotel and killed a man in cold blood. Even though Amanda would much rather ignore her mother, she must go to Toronto in order to understand what happened. Once there she realizes that she musts face her past and confront her fears if there is any hope for her to make something of herself. Now as an adult, Amanda hopes she has the ability to understand her mother and overcome her mother's control over her.

PUPPET is a good beach book. This book does not call for any deep thought nor does the book force any heavy concepts on the reader. In addition, it has just enough suspense to keep the reader hooked. Not to mention that if this book gets splashed by the pool or ocean or gets lost, the reader is not that upset by its loss.

Amanda Travis is not the most appealing character. She tends to avoid her past whenever possible. She tries to have one-night stands so she does not have to put any emotion into her personal life. Her clients are not always upright citizens, yet she always gets them off. Her attempts at self-isolation and her egotism make her difficult to read about.

As PUPPET develops, it is apparent that Fielding wants the reader to like Amanda or at least care about what happens to her. Unfortunately this is hard, as Amanda never completely warms up or overcomes her previous character flaws. While it is true that Amanda's childhood was not easy, she never overcomes it enough to be a sympathetic character.

Reviewed by Sarah Dudley, June 2006

[ Top ]


QUICK SEARCH:

 

Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


[ About | Reviews | Search | Submit ]
[ Home ]