Fire and Ice (Joanna Brady Series #14 / J. P. Beaumont Series #19)

Boring and puerile.

Characters are ill-humored and ridiculously combative to such an extreme point that I was tired of it all by page 10. A lot of garbage conversation, and no real investigative or forensic work. A boring book that was a drag to read -- junk.

1 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

Skillful Writing

J.A. Jance books have always had engaging characters and plots. Her latest books show more complex plots skillfully handled. Readers know each of her characters well and we look forward to another visit.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Brady and Beaumont: Together Again

I've read all of Jance's books and these 2 characters are my favorite. Having the 2 together again is the greatest since it's hard to wait for a new book in the two series. This book was a very quick read--I couldn't put it down once I started. The 2 characters work very well together. I hope she brings them together again in future books.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Fire and Ice

J. A. Jance has another best seller list book. Lots of twists and turns and in the end it all comes together to reveal who the bad guys are here. Beau and Sheriff Brady make a great team. I couldn't put the book down with all the information about illegals crossing the border.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

J.A. Jance keeps you hooked!

Yet another riveting book in the Joanna Brady series- it does get a bit gruesome though.
I have always enjoyed this author, and she continues to keep me captivated.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

another success for Jance

This was a good read. I cared about the story and the characters, and appreciate the care to detail that Jance gives both.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Combines J. P. Beaumont and Joanna Brady

A woman is found murdered in a dense forested area by Cle Elum. J. P. Beaumont investigates. Five other women have been found similarly, but this one had her teeth. Might be the big break in the case. She is identified as Marina Aguirre (aka Marcella Andrade) missing from Bisbee, AZ. This brings in Joanna Brady. One of Joanna's homicide detectives is the missing woman's sister.

Joanna's office is investigating a suspicious hit and run accident in an out-of-the way ATV recreation spot. It is later thought that the two cases are connected.

Joanna is also involved in a hotly contested abuse case at an Alzheimer's home where a patient went missing and a mysterious death occurred. A couple of bodies need to be exhumed to solve this case.

Marina/Marcella might have worn expensive clothing, boots and jewelry, but she worked at Denny's. She lived in a trailer park that was in reality a halfway house owned by a benevolent former hooker with HIV, who won the Powerball and lives in a mega-mansion. Marina/Marcella stole $50,000 from a drug cartel and left her son in Arizona.

The investigations switch between Seattle and Arizona and Beau and Brady. They interact mostly via phone.

I love both of these series and really enjoyed this book pairing the two investigators. I'd like to see more books done in this format. I think having a series where both investigators are involved would be great.

I like where Beau is in his life now. And Brady really has her department working well and her homelife as well. That's why I think it would work to pair the two investigators together. They're both secure in their lives.

I like the two locales as well. I am from Washington State so I recognize most of the locations. I like Arizona and would love to go back some day for a visit.

I highly recommend this book and both series.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Another Good Beau & Brady Mystery!!!

Fire And Ice: A Beaumont And Brady Novel by J.A. Jance

This is the second Beau and Brady novel and it went well, but I thought the two would get together sooner than they did in this book. Beau is on a case in the Seattle area that surrounds a missing woman from Bisbee, that has been found murdered in a dense forested area by Cle Elum. The one real break in the case, was that the murderer was afraid of pulling teeth, as the other 5 women were found without any teeth. Because this dead woman was from Bisbee, Joanna is brought in on the case, also because she was related to one of Joanna's homicide detectives. Since Joanna is working on a suscpicious hit and run accident in an out-of-the way ATV Recreation spot, she and her department are thinking the two cases are connected. Then, Joanna gets involved in a hotly contested abuse case at an Alzheimers Home that causes a patient to go missing and a mysterious death to occur. Joanna is certain a couple bodies will be needed to be exhumed to solve this case. I enjoy the humor and quirkiness of the townsfolk in Bisbee that I've come to think of as family, but Joanna's new ME I can sure do without as does the rest of the Sheriff's Department. This is the first book I've read, I believe, where the conversation switches from third person to first person, which can tend to get confusing, but on a whole, I would recommend reading Jance's highly entertaining suspense novels, esp Joanna's and Ali's.

Forever Friends Rating 4 Stars by Teri
Until Next Time, See You Around The Book Nook.

Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Pub. Date: July 2009
ISBN-13: 9780061239229
352pp
Series: Joanna Brady Series, #14
Available in eBook$9.99

More Formats Online Price
Paperback - Large Print - Large Print $20.79
Compact Disc - Unabridged, 9 CDs/10.5 Hours $31.99

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

What a lot of fun!!!

Having Joanna and Beau together again was quite a lot of fun and the plots just melted together you forgot they were different series characters. I definately enjoyed the plots and the intermingling. JA Jance is truly a story teller of great talent. I was trying to figure the connection right from the start and she filled in all the blanks beautifully.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Easy reading for a lazy afternoon

Once you start reading the Joanna Brady and J P Beaumont series you are hooked. If you start at the beginning of the series, you see the characters lives and careers progress. Very enjoyable.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Combining her superstars through an exciting story line, J.A. Jance proves she is one of the best police procedural authors writing today

Tamos Rivera was ordered by Miguel to kill the woman; pull out her teeth, pour gasoline on her, and light her up. Afraid of what Miguel would do to his family if he failed to carry out this command, Tamos obeys except for failing to remove the teeth. In the Spring as the snow melts in Washington state, her body is found. She is the sixth victim killed in the same way. ---------------------

State Attorney general's Special Homicide Investigation Team, including J.B. Beaumont and his wife Melissa Majors Soames, investigate the case. Using every method at their disposal, they find the latest victims was living in a trailer using the name Marina Aguirre, but realizes that was not her legal name. The team visits the trailer park owner and learns the deceased left behind $50,000 in her refrigerator before vanishing. The dental records affirm she was Marcella Andramade whose brother and son live in Cochise County, Arizona where Sheriff Joanna Brady works. Her sibling is determined to uncover his sister's killer, but Brody tries to stop him knowing his life would be forfeited too as well as devastating a federal operation in the works for months.---------------

While the main plot centers on the six dead women, Brody has her hands full with her own caseload including the murder of a man ran over by several ATV's and a nursing home scandal that increasingly looks criminal; she also deals with personal problems. Brody has no time to spare for Beaumont's case, but she does though that means even less sleep for the sleep deprived even when the feds tell her to back off. Combining her superstars through an exciting story line, J.A. Jance proves she is one of the best police procedural authors writing today as she balances two states two cops, and the nasty serial killer who connects them.----------

Harriet Klausner

1 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

Very good but confusing

I have read all of the Joanna Brady Series and I can't wait for the next one, but Fire and Ice, although it was a great read, the story line was a little confusing as it jumped back and forth between J.P. and Joanna. I would still recommend it.

Two minds are better than one.

Great to have the two characters back together again. Nice mix. It is good to have a strong female sheriff and a caring male cop. Read both series up to this point or you will loose some of the fun.

Jance does it again

I have all of Jance's books and enjoy them immensely. Fire & Ice is a combined novel of two favorite characters. The connection works but I'd rather have read two separate novels.

"Double double toil and trouble, fire burn, and chuldron bubble." Shakespeare

3 1/2 Stars.

Special Investigator J. P. Beaumont returns from vacation and attends the autopsy of the sixth victim who has recently been murdered and dumped in the Seattle, Washington area. All of the victims were young Spanish women who had their teeth removed, to prevent identification, and they were burned so badly that what remained was just ashes and bones. However, the last victim still had her teeth.

Elsewhere, in the lower Arizona area, Sheriff Joanna Brady is told of a homicide in her jurisdiction. The manager of an atv was murdered and run over many times by atvs. His body was guarded by his dog.

Brady and Beaumont had a history together. They worked on a case many years ago and both felt a spark. However, since Brady was married, neither pursued it.

Beaumont's investigation begins moving forward. The last victim is identified by her teeth. The nearest kin turns out to be Jaime Carbajal, a detective in Joanna Brady's homicide division. Beaumont finds that the woman was living in a mobile park and had a quantity of money. He thought that it was drug money and the killer was someone attempting to get their money back. However, there is a connection to a person who helps poor Mexican people cross the border to the United States. He charges a fee and if the young women don't have the money to pay the fee, he forces them into prostitution.

It is interesting to see the two protagonists of the author work together. It is also of interest to learn that this is one thing that illegal emigrants must be on the alert for.

The story went from Seattle to the Cochise County, Arizona area but at times this change in locale became confusing. Still, the author knows how to tell a story and this was a pleasant read.

Hooks You from Page 1

Everytime that J. A. Jance has brought the Beaumont and Brady characters together it has been excellent. The characters have pleasantly evolved in a way that hooks you and keeps the characters fresh. J. A. Jance books have never disappointed me yet.

Jance hits another home run with a return visit by Beaumont to a Brady story line.

The story starts with J. P. Beaumont's character following clues of a suspected serial killer that leads to Cochise County, Sheriff Joanna Brady's territory. After their last visit neither law officers are looking forward to meeting again, but they both are soon in the thick of things as related cases fit together.

Good read

I like the character of Joanna Brady. J. A. Jance is a fairly new author to me, but I enjoyed the two books that I have read very much. Keep up the good work!

Another in a series

this book is enjoyable if you have read her other books. Follows the same plot set up but you get learn a little more about each of her main characters. It was a fast read.

Too Much Fluff and No Grit in "Fire and Ice"

Frankly, I was not too impressed with "Fire and Ice". The premise of the plot showed a lot of potential for a satisfying, in-depth crime drama. This reader felt cheated because a diluted mystery was delivered instead. It took forever to get to the "meat" of the story, and there was just a passing face-to-face encounter between Brady and Beaumont. There's lots of fluff in much of "Fire and Ice." We side step into the back stories of minor characters, both familiar and new. A subplot involves a cover up of mistreatment of nursing home patients; another subplot involves a pending wedding that occupies too much of the reader's time and patience. I wanted to see more grit and development in crime solving. Jance missed a golden opportunity to involve Brady and Beaumont in a thrilling and absorbing follow-up story to "Partner in Crime," which is better than "Fire and Ice."