Confidence Woman

Rating:
Summary: Good Sense of Place, Not So Good Sense of Plot
Review: Claire Reynier is a fifty-something rare book expert who is thinking about aging. She compares and competes with her old college friends--who looks better, has a better husband, better job, better divorce etc. A former sorority sister cons Claire and others from the old college group, then turns up murdered. Claire is a suspect. She then investigates all the old friends to clear herself. Author, Judith Van Gieson, does a great job with atmosphere and her writing is very readable. She has some big plot and plausibility problems though.

Rating:
Summary: That's the way I like it
Review: I feel I owe Judith Van Gieson a special thank you for giving her readers consistently excellent novels. Ever since the Neil Hamel, and now with the Claire Reynier series, I've enjoyed her well defined, genuine characters, no nonsense plotlines as well as her remarkable ambience-rendering of the Southwest. The author sense of time and places proves once again right here. As a woman in her fifties, Claire Reynier has already had a share of ups and downs. She has settled for the best as a rare book expert at the Univesity of New Mexico and a life of her own spent between books, Tai-chi, a potential lover and a cat. When she becomes the prime suspect in the murder of a former classmate, she has to dig into a long-forgotten past and go through some sobering discoveries. With her sharp reflexion about what people really are about behind the scene, precise but thoughtful writing, Judith Van Gieson brings a definite plus to the mystery genre.

Rating:
Summary: I LIKED IT!
Review: I GRABBED THIS BOOK ON IMPULSE AND WASN'T SURE AT FIRST IF I WAS GOING TO READ PAST THE FIRST COUPLE OF CHAPTERS OR NOT, BUT I STUCK WITH IT AND REALLY GOT INTO IT. I ENJOYED CLAIRE, BUT WOULD HAVE LIKED TO SEE SOME CLOSER FAMILY AND SOCIAL INTERACTION.

Rating:
Summary: Good Show, Judith
Review: I loved the book. An entertaining book should take you away from your troubles during the course of the reading.....This one does....and does it well. Being from Santa Fe, I especially enjoyed the insights on Santa Fe women and the insights on women in general. The characters were very true to life and I know each one of them exists in my own world......By the way, Judith, we are passing the book around Santa Fe, pretty soon everyone in yoga class will have read it....!!!! Cheers to you !!