Rating: 
Summary: Best Seller???!!!???!!!
Review: I can't believe I swallowed the hype and bought this turkey. I only finished reading it because I thought it had to get better. I would rather read a stack of junior high poetry contest submissions than anything by this author. When I finish a book, I usually pass it on to someone I have recommended it to. I don't want to offend anyone, so this thing is going in the trash where it belongs. Don't waste your money or your time. Next time I will check the reviews at Amazon.
Rating:
Summary: the plot itself could make a movie on Lifetime or Oxygen
Review: do yourself a favor - don't waste your time with this book.
Rating:
Summary: Exit Wounds
Review: Don't waste your money! I only finished it because I paid full price for it. Writing is terrible, 5th grade level at best. If this is the best book you've read, the bar is ready to be raised. Last one I'll read by this author...there's much more out there.
Rating: 
Summary: A orphan's triumph
Review: Exit Wounds
is a disturbing book for envious cat and ferret owners to read. Although tragic, on a heartwarming level it is likely to be appreciated by 'committed' dog owners. It deals with the abusive deaths of a dozen innocent dogs slain by an incompetent who under- ventilates a shelter, then leaves the dogs, toilet seat down, confined in the overheated desert with the unbearable stench of an unpalatable dead human. A corrupt lawperson illegally takes the sole underaged survivor home as a potential sex slave of a family friend instead of properly consulting a kindly officer entrusted with such problems, herself a victim of the lawperson's budgetary mismanagment. The survivor is found in a makeshift shelter outside, where fortunately much of the psychological damage of vicious loss of the entire community was minimized. Although swift justice to the corrupt official is thwarted through political influence, the incompetent dog killer is at last punished. By pluck and personality the survivor ascends to a role as a security advisor to the now-contrite lawperson, which leads in turn to a rewarding career.
B. Musemeus
Rating:
Summary: Excruciating Reading
Review: For all the hype, (NY Times Bestseller??!!!), I was absolutley floored by how bad this book was. The writing is so poor I had trouble concentrating on the plot, which was probably a good thing.
How many times can each character say something "grimly"? Other repetitions with adjectives, verbs and adverbs (often in the same paragraph) drove me to distraction. Someone please buy Jance a Thesaurus.
Conversations between characters were vacuous, and Joanna's thoughts in italics were just plain stupid. Did I mention the exclamation points? That's 12th grade stuff, folks. Who the heck was the editor on this book?
The only mystery about this book was why I read the whole thing. Guess I wanted to see how truly bad it was, and I was not disappointed.
If you want good tight writing and twisting plots, try Karin Slaughter's books.
Rating:
Summary: Do yourself a favor and pass on this piece of garbage
Review: I also bought the hype of NYTimes Best Seller. Goes to show you some people have really bad taste. The story was promising and could have been exciting without the awful dialog. It seems like the author was being paid by the word - too much repetition, entire scenes which added nothing to the story, etc. I would NEVER purchase another book by this author. Glad it's over and this ones in the trash can... Charlie
Rating:
Summary: Good procedural, dialogue still wooden
Review: I always read J.A. Jance's novels, both the J.P. Beaumont series, and the Joanna Brady series, of which "Exit Wounds" is the latest entry. The story and the plot usually make it worthwhile. "Exit Wounds" is interesting for the sake of the illegal immigrant and homeless pet/animal "collector" issues that it deals with. However, I remain amazed that such a popular author has such stilted dialogue. Example: Sheriff Brady is meeting with her right hand man, Chief Deputy Frank Montoya -- '"Ernie Carpenter will be at the autopsy later this morning," Frank said. "Jaime Carbajal will start canvassing the neighborhood..."' Now, Joanna and Frank both work daily with these two individuals in a relatively small department. Are we really to believe that Frank is going to use their last names? And that everyone is going to talk in full sentences, with no slang or even colorful metaphor? Emotion in characters is handled just as clumsily: 'Joanna nodded. "This whole thing offends me," she said, her green eyes flashing in sudden outrage.' She nods, and then all of sudden her eyes flash? All she can say is that it "offends" her? I don't think so... a real person, actually offended, would twist a lip in disgust and say "it just grinds my goat" or some other colorful local expression (if they were running for office and trying not to swear, otherwise, they'd just say it {made them mad}). I do think that Sheriff Brady balances her compassion for the homeless pets and for the murdered and exploited humans in the story in a believable and reasonable way... it would be really hard to have to prioritize your outrage over crimes, but Jance's Brady handles it in a way that many "real" people would do well to emulate.
Rating: 
Summary: 10 pounds of ideas in a 2 pound book!
Review: I enjoyed the way in which Jance wove social issues (animal hoarding, immigrant smuggling, etc.) into an entertaining story. Joanna Brady is an interesting and likable protagonist but in this book she almost has a little too much on her plate. She's newly pregnant, has adopted two new pets into her home, her husband is starting to become despondent over his stalled career as an aspiring novelist, her older daughter is starting to compete in rodeo barrel racing, a woman is shot dead in her mobile home with her dogs trapped inside in 100+ degree heat, an SUV overloaded with illegal immigrants rolls over killing many....how much more can we pack in here?! I still enjoyed the book but just felt that this time Jance was trying too hard. Poor Joanna Brady is only human, not a superwoman, but Jance (and Brady!) seems determined to prove otherwise.
Rating: 
Summary: J.A. Does It Again!
Review: I have read every book by J.A. Jance. She is one of my favorite authors. This book is an excellent addition to her collection. I recommend any book she writes!
Rating:
Summary: Hard to Finish
Review: I listened to the abridged audio CD version of this novel and it was so bad that I hardly wanted to finish it. The story might have been ok, but the performance by Debra Monk made the sheriff, Joanna Brady sound tired and weak and her husband a total wimp. Yuck!
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