EVERYWHERE that MARY WENT (audiobook)(Rosato and Associates #1) by Lisa Scottoline

 

Originally published in 1994.

Audiobook version published in 2016 by HarperAudio.
Read by Teri Schnaubelt.
Duration: 9 hours, 5 minutes.
Unabridged.

Back in the 1990's, I worked at a used book store. A copy of Everywhere That Mary Went came in. I was intrigued so I read it.  After that, whenever a fan of legal thrillers would come in and ask if we had anything new or a little different I'd hand them that book. Soon enough, we were sold out and we kept on selling them whenever they came in. I even talked a group of ladies to use it for their book discussion group and they loved it. I sort of feel like I had a part in promoting Lisa Scottoline when she was starting out.

Eventually, this one book grew into a series of eleven books and I read most of them (maybe all of them - it's been a while). 

While I was scrolling through my possible choices of my next audiobook, I decided to go back and revisit this series. 

Mary DiNunzio is a lawyer from a working class background about to make partner in a fancy Philadelphia law firm. Things seem to be going well for her, except for the strange typewritten letters and the hang up phone calls at home and at the office. Also, there's the car that seems to be following her. Is it her imagination? Is it related to one of her cases? Is it from one of the other lawyers trying to make partner? Is it the creepy judge? Her supervisor?

I liked the audiobook, but I remember absolutely loving this book 25 years ago. It had funny scenes and endearing characters and it had been so long that I really didn't remember the plot at all. 

I rate it 4 stars out of 5. 

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: EVERYWHERE that MARY WENT (audiobook)(Rosato and Associates #1) by Lisa Scottoline.

DON'T GO (audiobook) by Lisa Scottoline

Published by MacMillan Audio in 2013

Read by Jeremy Davidson
Duration: 11 hours, 25 minutes

Unabridged

Lisa Scottoline breaks new ground in Don't Go. For years, she has written courtroom dramas and legal thrillers. This time, Scottoline tries to tie together two distinct stories featuring Dr. Mike Scanlon, a podiatrist from Philadelphia.

One is the story of an Army doctor doctor serving in Afghanistan and the other is a murder mystery.

 Scanlon is a member of the National Guard and when the story starts he has been called up and is serving in Afghanistan. Podiatric surgeons are in high demand because of the common use of IEDs (Improvised Explosive Devices) that explode under military vehicles and damage the feet of the passengers.

Mike has left a wife and an infant child back in Philadelphia. His wife dies from a household accident and his wife's sister and her husband care for the child as he rushes back home to make funeral arrangements. They agree to care for her for the duration of his tour in Afghanistan and when he decides to serve another year because they are in such desperate need of doctors with his special skills.

Lisa Scottoline

The problem with Don't Go is that these two stories do not mesh particularly well. The smaller, but much stronger story is the one in Afghanistan. Scottoline has done some research here and she tells it in a compelling and moving way. The characters have real zing.

On the other hand, the Philadelphia characters are very two dimensional and Scanlon's sister-in-law has an obsessive need to keep the baby on its nap schedule (and the never-ending conversations about the nap schedule) that borders on mental illness. When a father returns home from more than a year in Afghanistan with a horrible injury and wants to see the baby you immediately let him see the baby and throw the @$&%! nap schedule out the window for the day!

Scottoline throws in a murder mystery that just does not fit, but it does little to liven up the home front part of the story. However, the investigation by Scanlon is so haphazard and so full of gut feelings that it felt contrived - like a separate story was grafted to the main story just to add length and a little punch. Major family confrontations flare up and are solved so quickly that it seemed clear that Scottoline was trying to pad the story or really had no sense of how she wanted to end it. For what it's worth, I would have been very happy to have had the entire book just about the adventures of  Dr. Scanlon in Afghanistan.

Jeremy Davidson read the book and he did a solid, if not exciting job. He did a good job with the French accents of Scanlon's wife and his sister-in-law. Oddly, it is never really explained how Scanlon meets and marries this French lady (or, if it is mentioned, it was glossed over quickly and I missed it). One of the characters is mentioned as having a North Philly accent. I am admittedly no expert on Philadelphia, but to me it sounded like a combination of California surfer dude and Australian.

Note: I received a download copy of this audiobook from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

I rate this audiobook 3 out of 5 stars. This book can be found on Amazon.com here: DON'T GO by Lisa Scottoline.

Reviewed on August 14, 2103.

Killer Smile (Rosato and Associates #9) by Lisa Scottoline

Mary DiNunzio is back for more.

Published in 2004 by HarperCollins 

I have a soft spot for Lisa Scottoline. Many years ago I was working in a used book store when I ran across her first book, Everywhere that Mary Went and I loved it. We had two copies of that book and we must have re-sold them a dozen times after I started recommending them to people who asked for someone new to read. Pretty soon, Lisa Scottoline was one of our hottest items - we even special-ordered in some new copies! I like to think that I had a very, very small part in her success, even though the used book store is now defunct.

Killer Smile continues on with several familiar themes in Scottoline's books. Once again Bennie Rosato's all female (with the exception of an office manager) law firm swings into action in a case involving the Italian neighborhoods of Philadelphia. Mary DiNunzio, Scottoline's original character is back with a pro bono case based in history. Some Italians were sent to internment camps during World War II (much like the Japanese camps but not nearly as numerous) and this is at least the second book in the series that focuses on this sad fact of American history.

Lisa Scottoline

DiNunzio is investigating the mysterious death of a prisoner in an Italian internment camp, despite the 60+ year time lag. And, it turns out that some people do not want this old case solved and are willing to use violence to keep Mary away.

This is a fun, quick read - great escapist reading.

I rate this book 4 stars out of 5.

This book is available at Amazon.com here: Killer Smile.

Reviewed on October 6, 2007.

Look Again (audiobook) by Lisa Scottoline

Interesting premise but it often ends up being a glorified romance novel

Published by MacMillan Audio in 2009
Read by Mary Stuart Masterson
Duration: 9 hours, 27 minutes
Unabridged

In a planned departure from her normal books featuring female attorneys, Lisa Scottoline brings us the story of a single mother reporter (Ellen) and her adopted son. At the beginning of Look Again Ellen glances at one of those "Have you seen this child?" cards that come in the mail and she notes that the child looks just like her adopted son, Will.

A little digging by Ellen uncovers several clues that her son may indeed be a missing child, which leads us to the key point of tension in the book: If it turned out your adopted child was actually someone else's abducted child, would you tell and lose the child or would you stay quiet and leave another parent in pain?

Narrator Mary Stuart Masterson

I have been a big fan of Scottoline's work since I discovered Everywhere That Mary Went when I worked at a book store nearly 15 years ago. However, for me there was too much romance novel stuff that padded the book and slowed down and diluted the tension. Couple that with a plot hole at the end that is big enough to drive a truck through and I ended up a bit disappointed. It's pretty good but not as good as her others.

The audiobook is read by veteran Hollywood actress Mary Stuart Masterson. Masterson does a great job with the accents and voices, especially the voice of 3 year old Will. 

I rate this book 3 stars out of 5.

This audiobook can be found on Amazon.com here: Look Again by Lisa Scottoline.

Reviewed on September 17, 2009.

The Chopin Manuscript: A Serial Thriller (audiobook) by various authors

Published in 2007.
Read by Alfred Molina.
Duration: 7 hours, 30 minutes.

Unabridged.

The Chopin Manuscript is not really a great story but an interesting premise and veteran actor Alfred Molina does a fantastic job performing this audiobook. This book was given an "Audie Award" (2008 Audiobook of the Year) and that is entirely due to the masterful ability of Molina to mimic accents and create voices for literally dozens of characters. His performance was much better than the material he was given to perform.

The idea behind the story is pretty simple - Jeffery Deaver (The Lesson of Her Death), a well-known writer of action thrillers started out an international thriller by writing the first chapter. Then the story was handed off to another author and a chapter was added (15 authors in total) until it got back Deaver who wrote the concluding chapter.

The story is a thrill-a-minute ride that has a herky-jerky nature. Every author seemed to be out to move the story along as much as possible so character development was sacrificed for action. I do not know if an over-arching plot line was discussed among the authors but it seems clear that the minor characters were definitely out to be slaughtered (or ignored) throughout. Super villains are created in one chapter and then dispatched in the next without much fuss as the next author cleans up the other author's "mess" and creates his own. A whole chapter is spent developing a character that appears on maybe two pages worth of material in the rest of the book.

Lisa Scottoline (Everywhere That Mary Went) is probably one of the least "big time" authors of this book but her chapter was excellent - she eschewed action for character development and revealed the most awful betrayal of the book in a chapter that literally was set in just one room. I've always liked her work and was pleased to see that she went for smart storytelling over a splashy shoot 'em up chapter.

So, to sum up - mixed bag but an interesting experiment. I recommend the audio version since Molina's performance will make the rough patches in this book more palatable.

3 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: The Chopin Manuscript: A Serial Thriller.

The Copper Bracelet (audiobook) by Jeffrey Deaver and 15 other authors

Much like the last one in the series, the experiment in making the story is better than the story.

Published in 2009 by Audible Originals.

Read by Alfred Molina.

Duration: 8 hours, 31 minutes.
Unabridged.

The Copper Bracelet is the second installment in the Harry Middleton story. Harry is former military officer, former music teacher, current hunter of war criminals. Along with his compatriots, the Volunteers, Harry Middleton is after war criminals from Kashmir.

The story behind the book is pretty simple - Jeffery Deaver (Garden of Beasts: A Novel of Berlin 1936), a well-known writer of action thrillers started out an international thriller by writing the first chapter. Then the story was handed off to another author and a chapter was added (16 authors in total) until it got back Deaver who wrote the concluding chapter.

This is a slightly different group of writers than in the first novel, The Chopin Manuscript: A Serial Thriller. The Copper Bracelet is a bit smoother than the first book, but it still has its herky-jerky moments in which characters are introduced and then promptly killed. To me, the bad guys seemed rather James Bond Super-Villain-ish, which for me is too cartoonish to be interesting.

The most interesting feature of the audiobook is the last "Bonus" disc that includes an interview with the narrator, veteran actor Alfred Molina (Spider-Man 2) and an interview with Jeffrey Deaver and a couple of authors about the process they used to write the book. Most interestingly, no overall plot was ever discussed beforehand - the authors receive the completed chapters and have a limited amount of time to add another chapter before it gets handed off to the next author in line.

I rate this audiobook 3 stars out of 5. It ca be found on Amazon.com here: The Copper Bracelet.

Reviewed on March 10, 2010.

Think Twice by Lisa Scottoline

This may be the end of this series

Originally published in 2010.

 Bennie Rosato and her law firm full of female lawyers is back in Think Twice for what may very well be the last installment of this long-running series.

This will seem like a series of spoilers, but you can find all of these items on the back cover of the book: Bennie Rosato's long-lost twin (introduced in the book Mistaken Identity) turns out to be an evil twin who kidnaps Bennie, buries her alive and takes over her life.

So, ignoring the fact that seems that the premise was stolen straight from the "Plot Ideas That Ought To Have Been Retired" Hall of Fame, this book just does not have the zing of the others in the series. I love these characters and have been reading about them ever since I read Everywhere That Mary Went back in the 1990s. I worked at a bookstore at the time and whenever a fan of legal thrillers would come in and ask if we had anything new that was a little different I'd hand them that book. Soon enough, we were sold out. I even talked a group of ladies to use it for their book discussion group and they loved it.

Sadly, Think Twice just seems tired. I think it may be the end of the series because 5 major plot issues that have been threaded throughout the series have now been resolved - 2 personal issues for Bennie, one personal/professional issue for Bennie, 1 professional issue for Mary DiNunzio and 1 personal issue for Mary.

I do not recommend this book for anyone who has not read from this series before. I do recommend it for readers of the series because I think that this one was the finale.

I rate this book 3 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: Think Twice by Lisa Scottoline.

Reviewed on February 6, 2010.