Monday, April 13, 2020

Murder in the Secret Maze - A Review

Review

MURDER IN THE SECRET MAZE by Judith Gonda
The First Tory Benning Mystery

A picture perfect wedding ceremony leads to a nightmare of a reception when the groom vanishes. Landscape architect Tory Benning is worried about what could have possibly happened to her husband. Surely he hasn't jilted her mere minutes after their wedding. Searching the maze she designed with her best friend, she finds Milo's cell phone, smashed to pieces. Could Milo have been kidnapped? Or worse? When a police officer with a grudge tries to implicate Tory, she determines to find answers herself. Is Milo OK, or is the new bride a widow?

The first Tory Benning Mystery gets off to a great start. There's humor with an over the top hair stylist preparing Tory for her wedding, banter with the best friend serving as maid of honor, and a beautiful wedding which leads to a non-reception as the groom disappears. From this point on, however, things get weird. With the love of her life missing, mere days later Tory and Ashley are gaping over good looking men. Shortly after that Tory is getting all gooey over the private investigator. Sure a comment on good looking men wouldn't be amiss, but this had the makings of the start of a romance! While she believes her husband of mere minutes is dead, and it certainly seems that is the case, she doesn't know it. Then all manner of family secrets come out. Maybe one or two would be believable, but the amount here is staggering. Even Tory comments that it's like a soap opera. 

The writing style was good and the penultimate confrontation was exciting, but I found it difficult to get past the behavior of the protagonist, who I found I didn't really like. In fact, I didn't like the majority of the characters or their relationships with each other.

MURDER IN THE SECRET MAZE, while well written with an interesting plot, was laden down with too many unbelievable twists.

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