The Thousand-Dollar Tan Line

I wouldn’t have minded a bit more Logan but there are worse experiences when it comes to Logan and the Veronica Mars series, and even without enough of him, I still thoroughly enjoyed this, it felt very much like a bonus season of the TV series.

Mystery isn’t generally my genre, but this story of two young women missing during spring break in Neptune worked well for me, Veronica’s personal connection to the case added to the tension and emotion, plus the pacing was great with plenty of red herrings and twists.

I think this would be very readable even if you’re unfamiliar with the TV show, however, if you do come into this already a fan, you can expect to revisit most of your favorite characters and every single one of them felt show more satisfyingly true to their television counterparts.

Most importantly, if you love Veronica and Keith, this upholds their reputation as one of the best father/daughter duos in pop culture. show less

My name is Alice, and I am a Marshmallow. There is no getting away from that in this review! (And no spoilers either, I promise!)

The Kickstarter happened, we got our movie - the movie was bloody brilliant - and then it was announced we were also going to get a series of Veronica Mars books. Now, that second piece of news I took with a little more reservation. I'm always a little hesitant about a TV/Movie tie-in books which is not written by the original author. I used to read some of the Buffy The Vampire Slayer and Roswell ones (and Sweet Valley High, ha!) and they weren't exactly the best. Now, Rob Thomas - our fearless leader - was/is of course a novelist and he loves his characters as much as we do; importantly he still has creative show more control.. We could trust him to do the right thing, right?

After I saw the movie, I knew I had to have more of Veronica Mars! What the movie did was set her back in place in Neptune, where there was steal a whole heap of mystery and corruption to uncover.. I'm an addict and I needed another hit. The movie was not enough! I immediately pre-ordered the book! After the movie I had much more confidence in the potential of the books, but still when I opened it I was still hoping, with fingers cross.. "please don't suck, please don't suck.."

Now to the important question, to which I think you already know the answer to because I gave it 5 stars! - was it any good? Unreserved YES! Yes I loved it, every single page.. which I devoured effortlessly in less than two days.

Veronica Mars is a detective, so obviously this book is a noir-style mystery. Veronica is hired to find two missing girls who disappeared during spring break, and she has to sift through the danger, corruption and lies to get to the truth. And I won't say any more than that because I honestly would hate to ruin any surprises for Marshmallow who haven't read it yet! All I will say is that I found the mystery very well written, it had some great twists and I didn't know where it was all heading until the last ten or so pages. There was also a very real sense if danger and peril, like everybody in her life I was wanting to scream at Veronica - don't go in there alone, just get out of there!

I don't know how the division of labour worked between Rob Thomas and Jennifer Graham, but they perfectly captured Veronica's voice and the spirit of the show on the page. From the first few pages I knew it was going to be taking over the next few hours of my life, as I was immediately pulled in to Neptune. In fact I think I almost prefer to see Veronica on the page as you get a little more of her inner thoughts and feelings (obviously Kristen Bell does a beyond amazing job conveying this on the screen but there is only so much you can do), and in that way it is intimate. Her relationship with Logan, reignited in the movie, is explored as she struggles with the realities of him being posted away in the Navy, and the difficulties of trying to have a relationship over Skype. [Fangirl] It gave me ALL THE FEELS. [/Fangirl]

All of the other characters from Veronica's life of course also pop up. Wallace, Mac (who now works for Veronica, yay!), Weevil and Dick briefly. She also has to deal with her father recovering from his injuries in the movie, and the tension between them given his clear disappointment at her decision to stay as a PI in Neptune. The movie saw her make peace with herself and her compulsive need to chase the mystery, in this book it is time for Keith to start to deal with it. Veronica also has to confront some of the realities of committing to the adult world of Private Investigation; the very real dangers that lie there and how she will have to learn to protect herself. The Neptune of the movie and now the books is even darker and more corrupt that the TV series was.. There is some really scary stuff. (And you thought the Fighting Fitzpatricks were bad.)

If you are a Marshmallow buy it. Read it. Do it now! If you are a fan of detective novels I'd say there is a lot her to enjoy, but obviously it was written for the Veronica Mars fan and you will get more out of it if you understand the references and know the characters.

Five great big glowing stars for pure enjoyment, pure entertainment and pure Veronica Mars. I know that I will reread this book again, and the amount of titles I that with as an adult extends to.. well just A Song of Ice and Fire really!

The problem now is, how do I get my next hit?! I really hope there will be more books, and that they can continue in this quality. Even more than that I am dying for, craving a new TV series, or a movie! I had to chose between TV or books I’d 100% chose TV but.. the books are better than nothing. My only hope would be that Veronica has a bit more trajectory, and maybe some new characters. This book does play a lot like the TV series, I hope it’s just laying the groundwork for something a little different in the formula for the future. A whole series of books that work exactly like this one (as much as I loved it!) would start to get a little tired.

Most of all though, I am just so happy that Veronica is alive again! I hope all the old and new fans will continue to support it. show less

I really liked the way this explores the situation Veronica finds herself in at the end of the film. She has returned home to work in the family PI business, but she has to negotiate what it means to work with her father, and not just for him, the way she did when she was a teenager. She also has to negotiate a long-distance relationship - timezone differences and the frustrations of being dependent upon emails and Skype calls.

Other things I liked are things I like about Veronica Mars in general: Veronica's sarcasm and wit and quick thinking, her ingenuity in her investigating, her friendship with Wallace...

However, I wasn't just caught up in the story because I wanted to see more of Veronica and her world. The mystery is tense and show more unafraid of becoming dark; it twists in unexpected ways. It also collides with Veronica's personal life and leaves her unable to be a completely objective investigator.

The novel is written in a style which is heavy on the visual description. It's not a style everyone's going to to liking, but it indicated to me that the authors had the measure of their genre. Furthermore, with a few exceptions (like telling us what colour an unnamed journalist's hair was), the descriptions were effective - they build the atmosphere and provide insight into the characters.

I listened to the audiobook, narrated by Kristen Bell, who does a fabulous job of the voices. Obviously, her voice for Veronica is perfect, and her voices for all the other characters are great - they are nicely distinct and capture the characters' personalities.

... she had to wonder what it would be like when they had to go into the office together. Would they run tape down the middle of the room a la I Love Lucy? Would they even be able to wedge another desk in there? She imagined a toy-sized pink plastic desk next to his, a sticker reading "Fisher Price's My First Office Furniture" stuck to one corner. Her sitting with knees to her chest, typing furiously on a pretend computer while her father looked fondly on. show less

I've been a Veronica Mars fan since 2006 or so. The TV channels I had access to in Switzerland didn't air the show so I followed it through three seasons worth of DVD boxed set.

I was totally caught up the (to me) very alien but very believable world of Neptune High. I loved watching Kirsten Bell managing to combine being tough, witty and vulnerable as a teen PI haunted by the death of her best friend. The ensemble cast around Bell covered just about every ethnic group and social background available in Neptune. The plots were complicated and pulled no punches. So, of course, in 2007, at the end of the tird season, the series got cancelled.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5KvBAa2PuVo


In 2013, Thomas (the series creator) and Bell used show more Kickstarter to crowd fund a movie to continue the story. I wondered how they'd cover the seven-year gap between the final season and the movie and was relieved that they'd let Veronica grow up and that they hadn't made a mess of it.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iksrM_LNZ6s


This year, Veronica Mars Season 4 was released. I haven't been able to watch it yet, so, while I'm waiting for it to become available, I decided to give the novels a try.

I've never read of novel-of-the-show before. I was surprised at how well it worked. Of course, that might be because I'm filling in all the blanks in the text with memories of the show but mostly I think it's because the writing is smooth and fast and carried me along.

The most surprising thing was the impact of Veronica being all grown up. In this story, she's investigating the disappearance of a young girl spending Spring Break at Neptune. The start of the story is high-grade neo-noir. Then it gets personal.

Veronica goes to the party house the girl's disappeared at and it's very clear she's a generation older than them and sees the party differently. I didn't understand this kind of partying even when I was the right age for it and it's a mystery to me now. Veronica understands it, makes no judgement on it, but stands outside of it the way she stands outside most things.

The main difference with grown-up Veronica (and perhaps with the novel format) is how clearly Veronica sees the girl who has gone missing and the effect of her disappearance on others. It snapped me out of slick, witty, neo-noir and into something much more human.

The plot was much more complicated than I'd expected and kept me guessing through most of the book. I listened to the audiobook version, which is narrated by Kirsten Bell, which reinforced the link to the show.

I had fun with this so I'll also be reading the second book in the series, "Mr Kiss And Tell".


https://youtu.be/6ynLSsxhzyo show less

A great start to this new series! If only we would've had this comfort when they rudely cancelled the exploits of our favorite teen detective, huh? The book was faithful to the voices of the characters we know so well, the pacing brisk, & the surprise twists & turns in the case what I expect of Veronica Mars. But, in all honesty, these stories can be enjoyed by people who have never watched a single episode of the shows. Like I said, a great start to what I hope is a long running series!

http://tinyurl.com/onskprn

If you were a fan of the Veronica Mars TV series, you'll enjoy this better-than-average entrée into the now-official book series. (P.S. You don't have to have loved the movie to like this book, in case that's helpful.)

I say better-than-average because it is actually better than the average mystery. By average mystery, I mean something by Janet Evanovich or Lilian Jackson Braun. (Then again, they both started their respective series strongly, and this being the first book in the VM series, there's plenty of time to go downhill.) Weighed against those giants of American pop-culture mystery, Thomas and Graham's is most definitely heavier.

We start right after the events of the movie (again, you don't have to have show more seen or loved the movie to enjoy the book), and VM is getting the hang of her new life. There's much more Mac and Wallace and Keith than in the movie. There's very little of everyone else, including Logan. (Those of you who saw the movie know why.)

I enjoyed very twist and turn - and would understand if folks thought it too twisty - and being able to read about the ambience of Neptune as opposed to seeing it onscreen. The only thing I thought fell a little flat was the continual explanation of VM's inner thoughts - all her worries, concerns, emotional issues. And only because in the TV series we saw a way tougher character. I don't want to know that VM feels conflicted! I want her to remain tough as nails. show less

I read the whole dang book in one sitting, just couldn't put it down. It was like watching the first episode of a new season that takes place after the Veronica Mars movie. I won't be so sad if they don't make more episodes, if they keep this book series going. The tone was very true to the TV series, and the characters had the same feel, language and mannerisms. Well written, lots of fun with just the right amount of snark and misanthropy, and just enough plot twisting to keep you on your toes!