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Rating: 
Summary: Fun: 12 step theme; Skip. Deadly dull: the writing
Review: Cheez, it went on and on. Someone said it earlier...the Edgar has given Smith the "clout" to pour out bad writing.
If you just like to skip through a book til you find the (unbelievably implausible) culprit, you might like it. The 12-step theme and Skip Langdon are the only reasons to even pick it up with two fingers...but the writing is drawn out, repetitive, unimaginative, choppy - hell, if this were a senior high school thesis I'd send it back for revisions!Julie Smith should know better. We all had such high hopes with New Orleans Mourning. She should have stopped there, written a totally different kind of book. She has the potential of an artist...how far she has strayed. They should have made a movie of New Orleans Mourning so she could "retire" gracefully with stacks of money and not have to turn out detective stories over and over. Believe me, she's not good at it. She's not a James Lee Burke or Moseley or Sandford or Block. These writers can keep it going for some reason. How disappointing. Skip is a great character, but characters are only as good as the writing that surrounds them, and I'm afraid that, without a movie, Skip will be so much molasses in a few years.
Rating: 
Summary: Pretty awful
Review: I don't know how this book was ever published. Two murders at the beginning of the story followed by a couple of hundred pages of inane dialog, limited action and uninteresting characters. I was not engaged by the story at all. I simply wanted to get to the end and be done with this awful book.
Rating:
Summary: Pretty awful
Review: I don't know how this book was ever published. Two murders at the beginning of the story followed by a couple of hundred pages of inane dialog, limited action and uninteresting characters. I was not engaged by the story at all. I simply wanted to get to the end and be done with this awful book.
Rating: 
Summary: I Like 'Em
Review: I have read all of Julie Smith books and for an easy and fun read they are good. I especially like the Skip Langdon series as she is not a femme fatale and has her fits and faults, which make her more human like the rest of us.
Rating:
Summary: Fun: 12 step theme; Skip. Deadly dull: the writing
Review: I just don't understand these folks who give bad reviews to this series! I'm a voracious reader and quite discriminating and I find it to be perfect, simply perfect! I've now read every single one of the Skip Langdon books (even one that is out of print) and I can't find one single complaint about the ENTIRE bunch! The plot was ingenious and riveting in this 12-step murder whodoneit. There were so many suspects, I was baffled to the very end---but I *did* have my suspicions. LOL! Thanks, Ms. Smith for the best reading entertainment I've had in years.
Rating:
Summary: Dull, uninspiring and shallow
Review: I've just discovered Julie Smith and I can't wait to read more of her books. I like mysteries that also offer well written characters and ongoing storylines-detective Skip Langdon is interesting and likeable-a good addition to the line of women detectives. This was a good story with characters I'd like to read about again. New Orleans makes a fun and unusual setting. The story kept me anxiously reading straight through and was intelligent and well written.
Rating: 
Summary: A good mystery and New Orleans - it doesn't get any better.
Review: If you've ever lived in New Orleans you'll recognize the quirky characters. If you're like me and you MISS living in New Orleans, Axeman's Jazz, and Julie Smith's other Skip Langdon stories will transport you back there - as well as entertain you.
Rating: 
Summary: Skip takes on the 12 step programs
Review: The debut novel in the Skip Langdon series, New Orleans Mourning, won the Edgar Award. That's a hard act to follow and Smith sure tries. Many of the good parts of the first book are still present -- Skip's wonderful observations of Southern manners first among them. Got a killer holding a hostage outside? The Police are meeting at your house for a strategy session. Of course you serve coffee and cookies -- Cream anyone? Unfortunately, the Edgar also seems to have given Smith the clout to ignore her editors and this book is easily 25% longer than necessary. The fact that the killer must be among the 12 step crowd (Codependents Anonymous) and in the six assigned to Skip is determined early. We then go through endless pages without moving the mystery forward. Bottom-line: Still a nice sense of New Orleans but slow pacing make this an optional read. Reading of New Orleans Mourning helpful but not required.
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