Damage Control

First Line: Lauren Dayson was sleeping soundly when some small noise in the front room of the apartment disturbed her.

Sheriff Brady almost needs a road map to keep track of all the action. Her husband, Butch, is working on a novel and taking care of their infant son. A woman shoots a home intruder. An elderly couple do a Thelma and Louise off a cliff at the Chiricahua National Monument. The nephew of a Cochise County detective finds a body out in the desert. A mobile home fire leaves one dead and three homeless. Something's not quite right in an organization that operates halfway houses for troubled and disabled persons. If that's not enough, Joanna has two sixty-something sisters duke it out in a popular restaurant, Butch's publisher show more wants him to go on a book tour, and her own mother is acting very strangely...even for her. Some of these things are connected; some of them aren't. It's up to Joanna to make sense of them all as sheriff of a county that's larger than the state of Connecticut.

If anyone asks me about my favorite mystery series, this one is always one of the very first I mention. It's like coming home from a stressful day at work, stripping off the work clothes, putting on something old and comfy, and stretching out on the couch to get caught up with favorite family members and friends. None of the characters in these books are cardboard cut-outs. The way Jance has Joanna grow, not only as sheriff, wife, mother, and daughter, but as a person is a thing of beauty to experience.

As much as I love the characters and the plots of the books in this series, I also love them for the setting: Bisbee and Cochise County in Arizona. Reading these books made me ask my husband if he wanted to spend our honeymoon at the Copper Queen Hotel in Bisbee. When we got there, I fell in love with the town and the county. I've since discovered a lovely cottage in the Mule Mountains outside of Bisbee, and we return there every January. The history, the sky islands, the wildlife, the towns, the people...I've gotten to experience it all because of reading these books.

I would be hard pressed to choose a favorite book in this series, but Damage Control would be right at the top. show less

This book has an interesting start with an older couple who have made what appears to be a suicide pact--driving their car off the top of a nearby mountain. Well, that's got to be fun to read, right?
This wasn't as good as some of her other Joanna Brady books, but pretty good. The longstanding tension between Joanna and her mother begins to be a little better in this book.
The mystery isn't quite as intriguing as some of her other books, but still a fun read.

An elderly couple commits suicide together by driving off the side of a mountain at a scenic overview in front of witnesses. Why? A decomposed body is found in a couple of garbage bags, forced out of its burial in a wash during the Arizona monsoon season. These are just two of the things facing the overworked, under budgeted employees of the Cochise County Sheriff’s Office.

The story follows Sheriff Joanna Brady, the problems being faced in her jurisdiction as they handle the different situations and find answers, as well as what’s going on in her personal life.

This is the first book I’ve read in this series but this book works well as a stand alone, although it’s obvious that many of the characters in this book have been in show more prior ones.

The first page sucked me in when a grad student shoots and kills an intruder in her home who she thought was her abusive ex-boyfriend she has a restraining order against.

A ‘Novel of Suspense,’ there are too many things Joanna’s department is working on for there to be one whodunit that you try to guess at before a big reveal. But it does work well as a story where pieces come together from various sources. show less

I don't like Jance's Joanna Brady books nearly as well as her J.P. Beaumonts. Her third-person writing style really pulls me out of the story, particularly with her use of first and last names for characters in places where it's really not necessary. I find myself constantly rewriting sentences in my head, which isn't good. Use of the third person shouldn't distance the reader from the characters. Unfortunately, in this series, it does.

That being said, I did like the story. There were a lot of threads, none of which she left dangling. It's worth a read, but it's not something I'd read again, which is why I checked it out from the library.

An elderly couple drive off a cliff in a double suicide. This begins a chain of events that finally leads Sheriff Joanna Brady to a murderer. This thriller is an exciting story from beginning to end. Feuding sisters, a murdered woman and a missing man, both mentally challenged, and estranged brothers fighting over an inheritance all add suspense to this mystery. Joanna is really owning the job of sheriff, and it is intriguing to see her grow in her capacity in leading her police staff.

An excellent entry in the Joanna Brady series--investigating the apparent suicide of an elderly couple who drove their car over a cliff. Lots of characters and several sub plots. interesting characters

Sheriff Joanna Brady is investigating the apparent suicide of an elderly couple who drove their car over a cliff while suspecting there was more to it. In addition, she’s having a few problems with her husband and mother. I thought the crime and how it was arranged was interesting but the story spent more time on somewhat sappy relationships and another unrelated crime than the main crime. Overall, I found it disappointing.