Thursday, February 18, 2010

Fire and Ice [on Compact Disc]


Fire and Ice
by J.A. Jance

Another interesting crossover between Jance's two main series -- the Seattle-set J.P. Beaumont series and the Arizona-set Joanna Brady series. The story, itself, is fairly strong -- definitely character driven, with the harder-edged Beaumont investigating the latest victim in a series of prostitute murders, and Sheriff Brady involved with both a rural murder of an ATV park caretaker and growing evidence of malfeasance at an Alzheimer's care facility. However, when Beaumont's latest victim turns out to be the sister of one of Brady's officers, the separate casts of characters get the chance to interact. The Beaumont series is written in first person limited and the Brady series in third person omniscient, and for this audio adaptation Hillary Huber does the Brady sections and Erik Davies does the Beaumont. Both are very competent narrators. However, my only two complaints are that there were far too many plot threads left hanging at the end of the story; and I found myself vaguely put off by Davies' attempts to "feminize" the female characters' voices -- it sounded very fake. Overall, though, a good adaptation of a very good novel. [If you enjoy this, you might also like: Any of the other Jance novels, particularly Partners in Crime, the first crossover between Brady and Beaumont.] -- recommended by Scott C. - Bennett Martin Public Library

[Also available in print and Large Print formats.]

[ publisher's official Fire and Ice web site ] | [ official J.A. Jance web site ]

Have you read this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide web site. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide blog individually over the course of the entire month.

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