Rating: 
Summary: Easy Read for Mom's who love to read
Review: As a stay at home Mom of 2 I loved this book. It was perfect for the short spans I can find in my day to read. The story was involving and fun. I am looking forward to reading more books by this author. Written for Moms as only a real Mom could. Thanks Ayelet!!
Rating:
Summary: Easy Read for Mom's who love to read
Review: As a stay at home Mom of 2 I loved this book. It was perfect for the short spans I can find in my day to read. The story was involving and fun. I am looking forward to reading more books by this author. Written for Moms as only a real Mom could. Thanks Ayelet!!
Rating: 
Summary: Ugh
Review: As if the annoying Ruby wasn't bad enough in previous installments of this series, now we have Isaac who, at 2 1/2, is still nursing and seems to have the vocabulary of a college professor. And while less Ruby is a good thing, too much Isaac is a bad thing.
Another silly pretense of Juliet sticking her nose into something that doesn't concern her, and people telling her everything she wants to know for absolutely no reason at all. Nothing makes a novel less enjoyable than having no clue at all why the main character is involved or why people are opening up to her.
I'll give this series one more shot, but if the annoying brats continue to overshadow the actual story, I'm done with it.
Rating: 
Summary: A so-so mystery that lacks the wit of its predecessors.
Review: Ayelet Waldman had a great idea when she came up with the idea for the "Mommy-Track" mysteries. The main character in this series is Juliet Applebaum, an attorney who has decided to be a stay-at-home mom. Between wiping up the assorted messes that her two toddlers are constantly making, ferrying her kids to school and playdates, and tending to her other assorted "mommy duties," Juliet solves murders. What has made this series enjoyable thus far is that Juliet is usually witty and self-deprecating and the mysteries have been fun.Unfortunately, "A Playdate with Death," as brief as it is (a bit over 200 pages and undersized ones at that), is a chore to read. Gone is the humorous and easy-to-take Juliet, whose wisecracks are not particularly funny in this novel. Waldman has churned out a formulaic and labored mystery about the death of Juliet's personal trainer, Bobby Katz. Bobby appears to have shot himself, but Juliet suspects that he was murdered. Bobby was an easygoing guy who did not seem to be at all suicidal, and for some reason, Juliet feels compelled to solve the mystery herself. In the course of her investigation, Juliet barges in on all of Bobby's friends and relatives, including both the parents who adopted him and his birth mother. One of the ridiculous conventions of this type of book is that Juliet has no standing at all in this investigation. She is not a private detective, she is not a police officer and she is not even related to Bobby. Since the police have ruled that Bobby's death is a suicide, the case has officially been closed. Yet, Juliet manages to pry information out of an assortment of people who do not have to say one word to her. Yet, of course, they give her all of the information that she needs to solve the crime. Juliet's long suffering husband, Peter, puts up with her shenanigans, even though she is endangering both herself and her family with her "investigations." The formulas and conventions wouldn't bother me if the mystery itself were at all entertaining. Unfortunately, there is nothing compelling about this case nor is the uncovering of the murderer's identity particularly suspenseful or believable. If Waldman wants to get back on track, she needs to bring back the truly humorous Juliet Applebaum and she needs to craft a mystery with a little more bite and substance.
Rating: 
Summary: Improving
Review: Ayelet Waldman improves with each entry in this series. In this episode, Juliet Applebaum's trainer commits suicide...or is it suicide? Juliet feels something amiss and begins delving into his background, including his adopted family, his birth mother, his drug-addicted fiancee.
I enjoy these books because the author does a great job of mixing mystery with day-to-day life without compromising the realism of either. I am glad that she is involving Juliet in the private detective business of her friend Al, because in many series there occurs a disbelief when a "normal" person (one outside the private detective or police world, for example) runs across too many murders.
Looking forward to the next entry.
Rating:
Summary: A Playdate With No Depth
Review: I enjoyed this one, I think it's better overall than Waldman's second book, The Big Nap, because the plot doesn't seem as unbelievable. Stay-at-home-mom Juliet is getting bored with the routine, and manages to get herself involved in another questionable death, that of her personal trainer. While
his death appears to be a suicide, that doesn't fit either his upbeat personality or his recent actions before dying (such as ordering electronics over the Internet). Also, the two and a half year old, Isaac, comes along for some of the interrogations; while this might seem unbelievable at first, as a stay-at-home myself I found it realistic.
Okay, it's well-written, it's fun to read, but I did figure out the twist before I should have, when Juliet gets a threatening phone call (I won't spoil it here), and Ruby seemed oddly flattened in this book. After building Ruby up as stubborn and difficult in the first two books, and continuing to describe her that way in one section toward the end as a analogy for Juliet's own behavior, the 4-year-old child is completely cooperative in the book and in other sections is described as obedient and polite. Perhaps I'm unfairly comparing this book to the other ten mysteries I read in the course of the past week, written by Carl Hiaasen and Janet Evanovich; alas, Ayelet Waldman is not in their league (and few writers are). Waldman also referenced Sue Grafton as a role model in the acknowledgements, and maybe she's closer to Grafton than the other two (because I think Grafton, while rather compelling, isn't as interesting or complete in the way she fills in background and character). And unlike in her first two books, I feel Waldman here forgot to work on background because I got no sense of place in Playdate. It could have easily taken place in Las Vegas, Louisville, or Little Rock instead of Los Angeles. I wanted to taste the acrid tang of the smog, feel the curves of the Pacific Coast Highway, or be stuck in the snarl of the 405 knowing that there are six different routes home and none are any faster. Instead Juliet deals with an unsympathetic barrista at Starbucks, an Jewish family who disdains nonachievement, and a Catholic family who snub social inferiors; again, nothing about these people that requires them to live or die in L.A. Though I learned nothing new about the Southland or its denizens, there was a moderately interesting subplot about genetic disease, testing, and populations. Since a major plot point concerns the search by Juliet's (murdered? suicided?) personal trainer for his birth parents, there's a discussion of Tay-Sachs disease and I discovered there is another subgroup at risk to this genetic disorder that I'd never heard about before. While I always enjoy learning obscure information in my mysteries, perhaps others will find it either tedious or distracting.
Still, definitely great beach reading, satisfying ending, and some further evolution of the main character as her children grow up.
Rating:
Summary: poor writing and boring storytelling
Review: I had the bad idea of picking up this book for a long flight, knowing nothing about its author. It turned out to be worse than the airline food. The writing is truly awful, clumsy yet full of conceit. The plot and the characters seem lifted from things you've read somewhere else but much better realized. I confess I was quite surprised that something like this got published. That's the only real mystery about this profoundly mediocre, boring and superfluous novel.
Rating:
Summary: poor writing and boring storytelling
Review: I had the bad idea of picking up this book for a long flight, knowing nothing about its author. It turned out to be worse than the airline food. The writing is truly awful, clumsy yet full of conceit. The plot and the characters seem lifted from things you've read somewhere else but much better realized. I confess I was quite surprised that something like this got published. That's the only real mystery about this profoundly mediocre, boring and superfluous novel.
Rating:
Summary: Enjoyable but not as good as the first two ...
Review: I love Juliet Applebaum, the ambivalently at-home mom who solves mysteries for the intellectual challenge as much as for an excuse to get out of the house. The great things about Juliet haven't changed: she loves her children madly but remains refreshingly honest about the tedium of full time momming and she's still got her delicious sense of humor. Also, once she catches a whiff of a mystery, you can count on her to lunge for clues, even as the reader silently screams, "No, don't go in there! Danger! Danger!" That's part of the fun of accompanying Juliet on her detective jaunts. But something seems to be missing in this book. As Juliet searches for clues to the death of her personal trainer, she just doesn't seem to have the same verve as she did in Nursery Crimes and The Big Nap. The astute observations and wicked zingers are there, but come less frequently. Also, Peter and Stacy (Juliet's husband and best friend) who provided significant zip in earlier books are scarce in this one. Juliet's task in this mystery is to figure out whether her trainer's death was murder or suicide. When the answer comes, it feels abrupt and undeveloped. I closed the book feeling slightly dissatisfied. Perhaps I was spoiled by the excellence of the first two books in the series. This one lacks its predecessors' consistent humor and seamless development of character and plot. This book isn't bad. It just isn't as good as the other books in the series. I would say if you've read the other "Mommy Track" mysteries, borrow this one from the library. It's enjoyable and was a fun use of a few hours -- kind of like spending time with a lovable, vivacious friend who's having a bit of a subdued day. If you haven't read the other books in the series, I would recommend reading those first so you can get to know Juliet at her best.
Rating:
Summary: Questionable Paternity, Tay-Sachs, and Death
Review: I picked up A Playdate with Death because I was intrigued by its title and cover artwork. It is a well-written, fast-moving book. Author Ayelet Waldman seems to put a lot of her personal experiences into her books. Just like the book's heroine Juliet Applebaum, Waldman is a former public defender turned stay-at-home-mom. Applebaum often wavers from loving her two young children and movie-making husband and homelife to borderline resenting her family from keeping her from pursuing her career aspirations. In a very un-Dr. Laura way, Applebaum reflects: "Since I'd quit work, I'd found myself increasingly bored and frustrated with staying home. I'd left my job because I thought raising my kids myself was more important than working, but sometimes it was difficult to imagine my sighing, listless presence around the house was really doing Ruby and Isaac any good" (pg. 73). At this point, she must juggle her strong-minded daughter's schedule and drag around her 2 ½ year old son who still demands to be nursed (at one disturbing point, the child announces "bring me my breasts"!) as she investigates the sudden and suspicious death of her physical trainer. His death is deemed a suicide, but Applebaum is not so sure. Waldman obviously conducted a lot of research in writing this book, especially on the Tay-Sachs disease which plays a large role in the story. Some parts of the book seemed a little unrealistic, especially the ease with which Applebaum was able to get numerous strangers to open up about extremely sensitive issues. Applebaum seems to do no wrong in this book, getting answers she needs from people in only a few visits, having a cop turned private investigator beg her to work with him because of her legal skills, even succeeding in firing some rounds at a rifle range for the first time. Her distaste for firearms is also substantiated. The book is fast-moving enough to hold one's attention, but, to me, the circumstances surrounding the death were more intriguing than the whodunnit. One fun sidenote: when searching her trainer's laptop, Applebaum runs across a review the suicide/murder victim wrote on Amazon for a John Grisham book which "he liked...okay but he wasn't thrilled" (pg. 52). He probably gave it 3-stars like I am giving A Playdate with Death.
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