Every Crooked Nanny

That was...terrible? Awful? Horrible? Ridiculous? Offensive? Pick a synonym for bad and it would be accurate. Then add in cliche as a descriptor and you'd have this book in a nutshell. And yet I felt the need to finish it. Partially out of curiosity over whether it could get any worse (it could) and partially because at some point I was close enough to the end that I couldn't not finish. Sometimes that Little Engine that Could syndrome gets the best of me. I'm willing to admit to that.

The mystery portion of the story was mediocre and probably would have been okay if it hadn't been so cliched and flimsy. I picked out the killer the moment he appeared. Not that I ever quite understood his motivation - even after it was somewhat explained in detail - but whatever. I read a lot of mystery type books. I learned long ago that it's not a bad thing to figure out the who of the whodunit if the overall journey is fun or well written. None of that applied in this case. Instead there was a lot of character introductions combined with not much else that led to a lengthy discussion between two characters explaining the previous 300 pages.

The characters were ALL stereotypes. Name a Southern person stereotype and it was there - the fly fishing, laid back, lawyer/judge/morally decent character? Check. The almost crazy loose canon who probably carries a gun (though not always) and is missing teeth? Check. The white debutante former sorority girl who marries money? Check. The nosy, busybody mother who cooks comfort food? Check. The down on her luck, barely making ends meet lead female character who makes stupid decisions but winds up solving everything? Check. All that was missing was a banjo player named Bubba.

On a side note: I have only a little knowledge of Mormons and their religion, but holy cow were those stereotypes and portrayals offensive. It's called research. It's what good authors do instead of relying on preconceived notions and made up ridiculousness. I don't care when this book was written (early 1990s), there is no excuse for at least not making use of the library to get facts.