Where did I get this cover image? Yeah, from Goodreads.com
As acting Sheriff and on call, Ben Packard is called to a crime scene where he finds a man has been shot to death in his bed while his wife slept upstairs. Packard investigates the murder, digging into the Gherlick family secrets, including their narcissism, and deals with the inevitable death of the town’s Sheriff, Stan. The town council calls for the formal election of a Sheriff, so now Packard needs to decide if he’ll run. It’s not a job he wants, but his running mates are less than qualified.
I enjoyed the author’s previous novel, And There He Kept Her, where Ben Packard was introduced. The author put a few tiny breadcrumbs in the first novel about the reasons why Packard moved to Sandy Lake and picked them up right at the end of this novel, but left the reader without any answers. Instead, this novel ends on a cliffhanger.
The novel does solve the crime of the man shot in his bed, though. No loose ends there. The author has a flair for describing characters to make them each feel well rounded, even if they have very little page time.
I enjoyed the narrative style and kept finding excuses to keep reading, which is good. I’m looking forward to the third novel in the series as well.
Should Be Writing 