caslater83's review
1.0
The beginning was great. I thought I was going to enjoys this book. But as the secrets start unfolding, I realized that this is far from the book I had in mind. The books is written well, but I don't care for the graphic details. I know every family has its drama and you deal with the good, the bad, and the ugly, but there's just some stuff I'd rather not know/read about!
katieb94's review
dark
emotional
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.0
Although this is classed as a crime novel, there seems to be a focus on family drama instead of the actual murder which was quite distracting.
Detective Jill Zannos is of Greek descent. There are some elements of her culture where divorce and cheating are frowned upon yet it seemed to happen or bought up at family gatherings A LOT.
However, at the start of the novel she is called to a grisly murder of a young girl. The crime is throughout the novel, as we jump back and forth between what’s happening in the Zannos family and the murder. I didn’t see the twist happen about who did it and this was one the reasons I kept reading.
There were some elements of the story I didn’t like, like the suggestion that Jill has “powers” and can sense things about the victim.
It was a good book and I did enjoy it I just think I would have preferred it if the main focus was on the murder, even though it was good to find out more about the main characters family.
3/5 stars.
Detective Jill Zannos is of Greek descent. There are some elements of her culture where divorce and cheating are frowned upon yet it seemed to happen or bought up at family gatherings A LOT.
However, at the start of the novel she is called to a grisly murder of a young girl. The crime is throughout the novel, as we jump back and forth between what’s happening in the Zannos family and the murder. I didn’t see the twist happen about who did it and this was one the reasons I kept reading.
There were some elements of the story I didn’t like, like the suggestion that Jill has “powers” and can sense things about the victim.
It was a good book and I did enjoy it I just think I would have preferred it if the main focus was on the murder, even though it was good to find out more about the main characters family.
3/5 stars.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Infidelity and Incest
Minor: Suicide
xakyr's review
1.0
I really hated this book! The Point of View was all over the place, the mystery had a high ick factor when it came to who the culprits were and why they did it, and it tried to cram way too much into one book plot wise, even leaving it on a bit of a cliffhanger! I get that the author was trying to use the book to demonstrated the chaos of a big Greek family, but I felt a lot of things were getting lost in the shuffle. This was like a train wreck, you don't want to see it, but you can't look away. I'll be deleting the series from my Kindle library, and avoiding the author in the future.
lsmoore43's review
5.0
Suzanne has really outdone herself with this book. As much as I loved the Pam of Babylon series I have to say that I loved this book even more. Wonderful story line, great characters, great history of Greeks. I loved it from the very first page to the last page.
Jill Zannos is the daughter of a Greek grocery store owner, Gus, and a Detective for the Detroit Police Dept. It starts out with a gruesome murder of a young woman who Jill and her partner Albert Wong are investigating. The victim is a 26 year old beautiful young woman that still lives at home. She left for her date with her boyfriend Nick Fri. night and was found Mon. morning brutally sexually assaulted and then shot in the head. Her father, Jacob Parker a retired police officer called in a missing report when she was not home by her 11:00 curfew. Her mother Marianne Parker helped Jacob search everywhere for their beloved missing daughter. Jacob hated Nick, Gretchen's boyfriend because he was so much older that Gretchen and he just plain didn't like him. Marianne felt that something bad had happened to their daughter.
Jill has some psychic abilities that help her to see inside the victim and the people surrounding her. Jill's mother died when she was a young girl while coming back from visiting Jill's brother who was born with Down's Syndrome and put in an institution as a baby because the Dr's and her mother in law said it would be the best for him. Her father raised her on his own but of course had the help of his parents as they all lived above the store.
Jill would have breakfast every morning with her dad and he would make her lunch to take to work also.
This story has many twists and turn in it and things in the case that I did not see coming at first. It was not hidden what happen to Gretchen but I won't tell anyway. The family did a lot together and seem to get along very good, some too good at times. Christopher, Jill's brother was not Gus's son but he always went to see him and loved him as though he was. The Zanno's family has many ups and downs of their own that I look forward to reading more about in the next two books.
Jill is a strong woman but still can be hurt when the man she thought she knew betrayed her. This story has so much going on that I would have to write a small book here to really say how much I loved it and what about it I loved. I loved everything. It was well written and it was obvious that Ms Jenkins did her homework with this story. Learning about the Greeks was great and getting to know most of the family members was interesting too. They are a typical family in that they have their problems, up and downs, big dinners, fights and lots of love for each other.
I really loved this story and can't wait to start the next book, The Princess of Greektown. I gave it a 5 star rating because to me it deserved it and was such a good story. From beginning to end it kept me turning pages to see what would happen next. Great story Suzanne. Congratulations the start to another great series, that to me is even better than the Pam series and I loved every book in that one too. :)
Jill Zannos is the daughter of a Greek grocery store owner, Gus, and a Detective for the Detroit Police Dept. It starts out with a gruesome murder of a young woman who Jill and her partner Albert Wong are investigating. The victim is a 26 year old beautiful young woman that still lives at home. She left for her date with her boyfriend Nick Fri. night and was found Mon. morning brutally sexually assaulted and then shot in the head. Her father, Jacob Parker a retired police officer called in a missing report when she was not home by her 11:00 curfew. Her mother Marianne Parker helped Jacob search everywhere for their beloved missing daughter. Jacob hated Nick, Gretchen's boyfriend because he was so much older that Gretchen and he just plain didn't like him. Marianne felt that something bad had happened to their daughter.
Jill has some psychic abilities that help her to see inside the victim and the people surrounding her. Jill's mother died when she was a young girl while coming back from visiting Jill's brother who was born with Down's Syndrome and put in an institution as a baby because the Dr's and her mother in law said it would be the best for him. Her father raised her on his own but of course had the help of his parents as they all lived above the store.
Jill would have breakfast every morning with her dad and he would make her lunch to take to work also.
This story has many twists and turn in it and things in the case that I did not see coming at first. It was not hidden what happen to Gretchen but I won't tell anyway. The family did a lot together and seem to get along very good, some too good at times. Christopher, Jill's brother was not Gus's son but he always went to see him and loved him as though he was. The Zanno's family has many ups and downs of their own that I look forward to reading more about in the next two books.
Jill is a strong woman but still can be hurt when the man she thought she knew betrayed her. This story has so much going on that I would have to write a small book here to really say how much I loved it and what about it I loved. I loved everything. It was well written and it was obvious that Ms Jenkins did her homework with this story. Learning about the Greeks was great and getting to know most of the family members was interesting too. They are a typical family in that they have their problems, up and downs, big dinners, fights and lots of love for each other.
I really loved this story and can't wait to start the next book, The Princess of Greektown. I gave it a 5 star rating because to me it deserved it and was such a good story. From beginning to end it kept me turning pages to see what would happen next. Great story Suzanne. Congratulations the start to another great series, that to me is even better than the Pam series and I loved every book in that one too. :)
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