Ball & Chain – March 2, 2014 Author: Abigail Roux | Language: English | ISBN:
1626491070 | Format: EPUB
Ball & Chain – March 2, 2014 Description
- Series: Cut & Run
- Paperback: 306 pages
- Publisher: Riptide Publishing; 1 edition (March 2, 2014)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 1626491070
- ISBN-13: 978-1626491076
- Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.2 x 0.7 inches
- Shipping Weight: 13.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
This couldn't have been written by the same author who wrote the rest of the Cut & Run Series. No, some sitcom comedy writer had to have written this disappointment. Every page, every situation, was ruined by lame attempt at inappropriate humor. I could practically hear the track laughter in the background. Examining a dead body, make a joke. Interviewing possible suspects, make a joke. Revealing a possible debilitating illness, make a joke. While other books in the series had humor and one liners, this one was saturated in it! To the point where it was one epic eye roll after another. Ty is supposed to be so much more subdued and quiet since his return but there was no evidence of that in the book, not with all the giggling and joking.
None of it was actually funny.
I used to be captivated by every page in this series. I would read every word in one sitting and quickly want to reread it. Not so with this book. So many times I put the book down and walked away and it was harder to pick it back up again. It's so close to the end of the series so I forced myself to continue.
My biggest problem was Nick and Kelly. I can't see them as anything other than a fan service and I was really disappointed by their prevalence in Ball & Chain, especially considering they already have their own series. Their relationship feels forced to me and Kelly acted more like an annoying child most of the time. So much has changed in the series to accommodate them and I hate it.
I was VERY disappointed and angry that Nick and Kelly had a proposal in this series BEFORE Ty and Zane's proposal. That really bothered me! What, their series isn't doing so well they were promoted in this one? It was blatantly obvious that was the case. They were everywhere.
I love this series, but this is a book only for the die hard fans. While the plot of some of these books has always been occasionally iffy, the central romance and character development between Ty and Zane has always more than mad up for it. I loved the first three books... and then hit Armed & Dangerous and wondered if I was going to have to give up (Cross bored me to tears, the plot was trite, Ty and Zane were shifted out of the spotlight). Fortunately, the next couple books got us back on track, with the slight exception (and I'm stealing from someone else's review here, because I didn't really notice it until another reviewer pointed it out) that Ty got a bit watered down as a character (originally, he was sporadically manic in that crazy-like-a-fox way that comes from seeing the world just a bit differently, like using your partner as a human shield or thinking that a grandfather who beats people with a shovel is perfectly normal). Ball & Chain, however, puts us back into laborious territory, where it feels like the author is no longer charmed or inspired by these characters and is writing to hit a deadline. The only good part about stealing the entire plot from Clue (yes, the board game!) was that at least someone made a joke about it so we know that it's an in-joke rather than a mistake. I did appreciate the several ways that "ball and chain" were used throughout the novel, but in the end the humor did undermine the pathos. Ty and Zane have always resonated with me because even when they are ridiculous they act like real people, frustrating, occasionally inept fumblers with their own issues who ultimately treasure each other so much that I believe that they would be driven to do some of these crazy things.
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