Guaranteed to Bleed (The Country Club Murders) (Volume 2)
By: Julie Mulhern
Rating: 5 of 5
I loved “The Deep End” and was a little concerned that the second book in the series “Guaranteed To Bleed” might not live up to it (as is the case with so many sophomore efforts by new authors. I was really happy to discover that that was not the case with Julie Mulhern’s latest. It is also great that the humor is there and that I read most of the book with a smile on my face for so long, it made it ache a bit.
The story picks up (in 1974) a few months after the events in “The Deep End”. Ellison Russell and her daughter Grace have just returned from a trip abroad and are trying to settle into their home after the life-changing events that had recently happened to them.
I could relate to the story as I was a young teenager during this period and a lot of what Grace says and does are probably close to things that I said and did, too. My poor late mom! I love the dynamic between Ellison and her mother as well as between Ellison and her daughter. I’ve been in all three places and can attest to the accuracy of how they are portrayed.
Well, it would not be a murder mystery if there wasn’t a murder. It is a particularly sad one and the author handles it very well. Ellison, of course, is drawn into the mystery as she received the last wishes of the murder victim and feels honor bound to fulfill them. It puts her into a world of danger and she has two very nifty men in her life (Detective Anarchy Jones and her lawyer and would-be suitor, Hunter Tafft) to give her a hand from time to time.
The only problem with this book is that once I finished it, I was ready to read the next one. Hopefully, that will be forth-coming in the near future because I can hardly wait to find out what Ellison is up to next.
I received a digital ARC copy of this book from the publisher, Henery Press, via Netgalley.
I loved “The Deep End” and was a little concerned that the second book in the series “Guaranteed To Bleed” might not live up to it (as is the case with so many sophomore efforts by new authors. I was really happy to discover that that was not the case with Julie Mulhern’s latest. It is also great that the humor is there and that I read most of the book with a smile on my face for so long, it made it ache a bit.