Wiskey Sour – (Jack Daniels Mysteries Book 1)
By J.A. Konrath
Rating: 5 Stars
“Lieutenant Jacqueline “Jack” Daniels is having a bad week. Her live-in boyfriend has left her for his personal trainer, chronic insomnia has caused her to max out her credit cards with late-night home shopping purchases, and a frightening killer who calls himself ‘The Gingerbread Man’ is dumping mutilated bodies in her district.
While avoiding the FBI and its moronic profiling computer, joining a dating service, mixing it up with street thugs, and parrying the advances of an uncouth PI, Jack and her binge-eating partner, Herb, must catch the maniac before he kills again…and Jack is next on his murder list.”
I came to this series just a little bit backwards when I first discovered “Bloody Mary”, the second book in the Jack Daniels mystery series. But you know what? It doesn’t matter, these books can be read independently, so I looked up what book actually came first and downloaded “Whiskey Sour”.
Call me sick and twisted but I love how Konrath gets into the criminal mind. His villains are twisted, sadistic and real enough to sometimes make you go “geeze dude, relax!”….but they are decadently dark. The darkness pairs well too with Jack’s (aka Jacqueline) smart-ass sense of humor and wit. It’s almost like a luscious dark chocolate raspberry cake with the perfect mixture of bitter to sweet.
Jack and her partner Harry have this same combination, not nearly so dark but they blend well together. The two have worked together so long that they are more familial than teammates and their repartee is something I really love as well. There’s a loving snarkiness that shows up in the way the two interact that I find endearing.
Sure, Jack has a lot of smart-ass one-liners and I have seen a few reviews that think that this makes her unbelievable. For me, this only adds to her believability. I find Jack relatable in so many ways and one of those ways is her sarcastic sense of humor. This book isn’t chock full of humor, it’s not supposed to be, it’s not lighthearted fare….it’s a mystery that deals with a psychopathic killer. You just have one character that has a very snarky attitude that can at times lend some humor to a tense situation….how is that not realistic?
I don’t often dole out 5 stars but this time I will. Were there a few problems with the story? Yeah, a few things were pretty transparent but all in all I found it to be well written. What put this one from a 4 star to a 5 star for me was the entertainment value I received. I was thoroughly entertained by this story.
I felt the suspense while the Gingerbread man waited in the closet. I hurt with Jack when she was shot and I mentally gave a high five to her new beau when he wasn’t easily scared off. Mr. Konrath managed to insert me mentally into the book, I invested in his characters and that for me is a big deal.
So, while I could write so much more about this book, I’m not going to…because I’m going to go get a copy of “Rusty Nail”, the third book in this series! Must see what Jack is up to next!
As always, if you read this book let me know how much you love it…..I mean, what you think of it too.
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