First in series ok, rest get better
935064
I love The Stephanie Plum series and keep on the look out for more by this author. This first book in The Full Series is a rewrite from an older version. It is a typical romantic novel that is enjoyable once in awhile, but the mystery is predictable. The read is quick and light reading. HOWEVER the important thing about this book is the introduction Of Max since he is one of the lead characters in the upcoming series. The other books are better mysteries with a light, fun atmosphere you find in The Plum books, including the sexual tension between the main characters. I have read Full Tilt and Full Scoop and have now just started Full Blast. They are not as meaty as The Stephanie Plum series, but I still enjoy them.
1752238
Good opening for the series. Hope the next book is a little deeper. Good and bad should not be so black and white. Blur the lines a little.
4101621
I was a little bit disappointed in the first book, but I find that I'm often too overly optimistic about a new author's first work.  This book is better.  Not a LOT better, but definitely better.  I think maybe Greenwood's getting comfortable with this whole "writing" thing and I'm hoping that the rest of the series will continue to improve.

Still a light read, but better plotted than the first book.  I'm holding out hope for Book number three to be even better...
3110116
It's okay, just started watching.  Maybe it will get better.
2534369
Lost a fair amount of bed time.  Now waiting for the next book.
202049
This one went by fast, just like all the others, but it felt kind of empty at the end. I had no clue what was going on most of the time, Charley's personality seems to be getting weaker instead of stronger, as required for the plot, and no strings were tied up. In fact, so many new questions arose that the series may never finish.

Don't get me wrong, the author has a nice style and does a fine dance between action and description. The reading is pleasant, even if only superficial. But, really - how many times can the words just drool over one of the characters? That seemed to be the real point of the whole thing, in fact. Not moving forward, not tying up story lines, not advancing the characters - just panting over Reyes and marking time until the next sex scene.

I have enjoyed the series and do enjoy the fantasy genre, but after reading Jasper Fforde I would like a bit more substance and wit. I tire of Charley's self-centeredness and foolhardy plans and ongoing coffee requirements. But that's just me.
1234777
Not bad, for what will be the first of many novels in her new series. I'm sure the tempo will pick up with the second and third books.
1958214
It's good, but not his best - which is a high bar. Mostly, it seems to transparently be the 'first in a series' and the ending is somewhat unsatisfying. Still, it is far better than most of the 'resting on their laurels' authors are producing.
2053643
I like this series. Unlike a lot of this genre, the story is not so dark as to send you into depression. What I find near unforgivable is when an author forgets the name of an important character. Ben's detective colleague Frank in book 1 got renamed Mike in book 2. Took me a while to figure that out. That just kicks you out of the story. Could have been a four star otherwise. Edit: after finishing the story, I'd call it three and a half. There is one additional note to the author. It's not "your welcome". It's "you're welcome" as in "you are welcome". Lots of other misuses of possessive your where the contraction you're is required.
159103
This book was an ok read, not riveting since I put it down often to read other books, even  to reread other books. Maybe the next book in the series would be better. This I believe was the first and yet it seemed to start the characters in the middle of the story. Maybe I was wrong and it is not the first in which case the book cannot stand on it's own from the series. Just an ok read.
802739
Melissa F. Olson's Scarlet Bernard series got off to a slow start and, though the later books are better than the first, Olson painted herself into a corner by, among other things, destroying virtually every relationship in the main character's life, including the character's own relationship with her life. Olson probably made a good decision when she decided to set her new Boundary Magic in the same universe but give it a fresh set of characters and a new locale. While Allison Lex Luther's experience as a traumatized female Iraq war vet who also happens to be a witch doesn't exactly make her the girl next door, it does make her more understandable and relatable than "null" crime scene scrubber Scarlet Bernard.

In fact, with Lex in her home town of Boulder and her community of sometimes-friendly/sometimes scary witches and vampires, Olson seems to have consciously or unconsciously modeled her new series on Kat Richardson's&nbsp;<a data-hook="product-link-linked" class="a-link-normal" href="/Greywalker/dp/0451461320/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_rvw_txt?ie=UTF8">Greywalker</a>&nbsp;series, with her tough PI protagonist Harper Blaine, her home town of Seattle, and her hot and cold relations with witches and vampires. Both women see ghosts, both women have died multiple times, and both women have to delve into the histories of their home towns in order to achieve their goals. My point is not that the Boundary Magic series is a rip-off; actually, I think that Olson has picked a good model and is doing well with it. Furthermore, I think it's fair to say at this point that Olson's work is at least on par with Richardson's.

I haven't said anything yet about the plot of "Boundary Lines." It's a bit convoluted, but the upshot is that somebody or something is fooling around with the magic in Colorado, the potential consequences are dire, and in order to prevent the world from coming to an end (at least in a small way), Lex must heal past wounds, work with her friends, and gain new powers. There's some romance, some revisiting of past traumas, some best-forgotten nonsense with the police (best forgotten because it's not handled well by Olson), some action involving werewolves, vampires, witches, ghosts, and a giant people-eating monster, and and some not great/not terrible use of Colorado history to provide a sense of place and context. Not everything works, but when you take it all together, it's a satisfying read. Recommended to those who have followed Olson's work so far.
2622452
I like this series, so it was a  no-brainer to buy the next installment.

Try the first book of the series, and then if you like it, settle back and enjoy.
769798
OK for the first of a series.  In my experience reading JA Jance, her series get better as they progress.  I'll read the 2nd & 3rd in this series and see how it goes.
2661145
Good series, awaiting forth book in the series.
1564907
It was fairly predictable but still moderately entertaining. The first in the series was better, IMO.
2661687
This is an acceptable addition to the series, not the best but not the worst. I liked the interaction with the cast of characters but it read as very safe - the author needs to shake it up a little in the next book. I liked the investigation and the way the resolution was arrived at. Looking forward to the next in series
3938626
This is the second mystery featuring Inspector Roy Grace I've read, and while I enjoyed it better than the author's US debut, it still hasn't caught my imagination and turned the series into a "must-read" for me in the same way that other new discoveries have done (I'm thinking of authors like Elly Griffiths, whose contemporary novels are gripping, and Imogen Robertson, author of a new series of historical mysteries), nor am I enjoying them as much as I am discovering the long series by Peter Robinson.

The basic plot is simple: Carly is driving to work, hungover after a bad blind date the night before, and ends up narrowly avoiding a fatal accident, but only by plowing into a storefront. A cyclist -- riding down the wrong side of the street -- dies; he's an American student and the grandson of an imprisoned Mafia don, with a violent and revengeful mother. When the people involved in the accident start dying in gruesome murders, Roy Grace has to wonder whether the mother has hired a hitman, and warns Carly she could be next. (No spoilers here: it's all on the book's jacket copy.)

This was gripping enough to keep me reading, although not that memorable in any way. Some of the plot twists were predictable, and Carly really wasn't such an interesting character. The basic crime narrative was interspersed with some meh drama about Grace's personal life, which really didn't fit into the story well (perhaps I'd think differently had I been following the series from the beginning) and a caricature of a hit man, whose shtick is that he "doesn't do empathy"; doesn't do understanding, blah blah blah.

Don't get me wrong; this is a solid enough book. For my taste, however, the plot was a bit pedestrian and there wasn't enough there from the characters that was memorable enough to make up for that. A 3.5 star book, rounded down. Not sure this is a series I'll keep reading, and I'm not interested enough in Grace and his story to go back to the beginning. For newcomers to the series, I'd definitely recommend taking the time and trouble to hunt for book #1 and read them in order -- I suspect you'll get the most out of the characters that way.