ChristianHitched Regan Reilly Mysteries No 9
The date is Saturday, April 2. Five April brides discover their wedding dresses have been stolen. One of the brides is private investigator Regan Reilly. Her wedding is in seven days.
Regan Reilly and her fianc?, Jack “no relation” Reilly — head of the NYPD Major Case Squad — are getting married! Regan had the perfect dress made by two young designers on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. Arriving at the bridal salon to pick up her gown, Regan discovers the shop has been broken into, the designers bound and gagged, and wedding dresses for four of the April brides (her dress included) are missing. A fifth dress is in shreds on the floor. Even though it’s a week before her wedding, Regan gets on the case, and in the process she meets an unusual mix of brides and grooms-to-be, or — perhaps “not-to-be.”
Over at One Police Plaza, Regan’s bridegroom, Jack, is trying to solve a perplexing series of bank robberies. The robber, nicknamed “The Drip” by the NYPD because he always strikes during rainstorms, has been eluding the police for months. Jack is determined to crack the case before his upcoming nuptials.
Carol Higgins Clark fuses the two seemingly unrelated mysteries with an ingenious twist, taking readers from the streets of New York City, to the casinos of Atlantic City, and finally to that most popular wedding spot — the one and only Las Vegas. She weaves a web of mystery around a charming, humorous tale of five April brides and the trials and tribulations they face planning their weddings.
User Ratings and Reviews
3 Stars Mystery, or Romance? Either way the book needs improved!
I am new to this author and I acquired the novel via my neighbor. I guess I should have known something was up because she wasn’t excited about the book when she gave it to me, but I thanked her gratefully and read it.
If by chance you haven’t been informed, the title is derived from the main character, Regan Reilly, a private detective from California, and her plans to marry Jack Reilly, of NYPD.
However, a short time before the wedding, Regan decides to pick up her wedding dress and low and behold, she discovers that the dress shop owners have been robbed of 20 thousand dollars in cash and on top of that, her wedding gown had been stolen. At the same time, Jack Reilly has his hands full trying to locate the person(s) that have been robbing banks.
By this time I’m a little frustrated with this story. Is it a mystery? It claims to be. Or is it a romance and a mystery? I read on, but the author’s storytelling abilities never improved. The characters were a mixed bag of alphabet soup. After awhile I found them down right boring. Not one to give up (Growing up on a dairy farm taught me that quality) I was determined to finish this novel. The ending was disappointing and I felt that the author gave little or no thought to improve the story at this point. That was a shame because with a little effort on the writer’s part, the ending would not have been so bland and disappointing.
I put the book down, inhaled deeply and thought about how much I value quality literary works from both well known and lesser known authors, and wondered “How does something like this novel get published?
4 Stars Romeo saves the day
This story of a top designer’s April brides losing their wedding dresses to an inept pair of thieves was an interesting read to me. The Bridezilla theme was overplayed a bit, but one hussy does redeem herself helping to rescue one casualty of a dangling subplot. The bank robbery second mystery didn’t quite jell. However, the flashes of humor win out, such as the pet parrot Romeo whose favorite expression is “lazy bums,” referring to the main culprits.
1 Star Too many sub-plots…
This book was bad from start to finish. Having read one of the author’s mother’s books and not been impressed, I should have known that this one would not be to my taste either. Although Ms. Clark did a good job of keeping someone who had not read the previous Regan Reilly mysteries up to date, her characters were shallow, there was no suspense, and there were too many subplots. Who cares who is robbing the banks, who cares what happened to this secondary character who disappeared? Ms. Clark did not need these filler subplots to bring this book together, and yet that is what she used them for. All I know is that I have been cured from wanting to read any of Carol Higgins Clark’s other Regan Reilly “mysteries”.
2 Stars Bored to tears
After reading this author’s other books I picked this one up at the airport to keep me company during a long flight. Let me just say I never finished the book and was very disappointed. I love Reagan Reilly but this adventure of hers was a bit too much. Don’t waste your time.
2 Stars Needs a fact checker!
A ridiculous plot, but somewhat fun to read. Ms. Clark needs to know more about gambling, since she has the bad guys shooting craps in Atlantic City, then the Rileys interview the dealer-uh?! I pictured a guy throwing handfuls of dice around.Also at craps, you win or lose-no other player wins money from you. And I suspect going thru Nebraska isn’t the shortest way from NYC to Vegas.Now I will be wading thru “Laced” Hope it is better.
UGH! I listened (well, started to) this book on audio tape and it’s read by the author herself – who does such an abominable job I almost stopped listening just because of that. (She overemphasized words like she was reading to a kindergartener – very annoying!) I couldn’t even get through the entire first disc because the plot was so convoluted and boring, I hope the main characters would all get shot and die so the book would end. I’ll never buy another Carol HIggins Clark book again – that’s for sure!