Don't be mislead by the gathering of women in the opening chapter discussing helps and hints at homemaking. Their catty and snarky comments do play a factor in the story, but this is not your typical story of women homemakers. Death and murder play a much stronger role in this story than homemaking.
I confess that I had trouble with this book. First, I couldn't make up my mind if it was intended to be a serious thriller or a parady of one. The tongue-in-cheek humor along the way got in the way of my feeling the serious thriller in it. I also was bothered by a whole chapter being devoted to hints and tricks at bathroom cleaning. Second, the author wrote the story in extremely short chapters, switching the focus frequently between the shady female mortician, the female assassin, and the middle school kids. All these threads ran pretty much in parallel through most of the book, but come together well at the end. My problem was that between the short clips and the constantly shifting focus it was easy to loose both my focus and interest--especially in the early stages of the book. A third problem I had was that what appeared to me to be one of the key threads--the one that tied the story together--was not introduced until chapter 11. That is just wrong. It was not until I discovered Corey and Evan that I finally found my legs in this story.
All in all, I found it an adequate read, but far from perfect. It is not one that I would recommend to a friend.
I confess that I had trouble with this book. First, I couldn't make up my mind if it was intended to be a serious thriller or a parady of one. The tongue-in-cheek humor along the way got in the way of my feeling the serious thriller in it. I also was bothered by a whole chapter being devoted to hints and tricks at bathroom cleaning. Second, the author wrote the story in extremely short chapters, switching the focus frequently between the shady female mortician, the female assassin, and the middle school kids. All these threads ran pretty much in parallel through most of the book, but come together well at the end. My problem was that between the short clips and the constantly shifting focus it was easy to loose both my focus and interest--especially in the early stages of the book. A third problem I had was that what appeared to me to be one of the key threads--the one that tied the story together--was not introduced until chapter 11. That is just wrong. It was not until I discovered Corey and Evan that I finally found my legs in this story.
All in all, I found it an adequate read, but far from perfect. It is not one that I would recommend to a friend.