Pun Salad

This book made the WSJ's Best Mysteries of 2021 list, setting up a small reading project for me. Six down, three to go on that.

Most of the book is narrated first-person by Bree Cabbat, an early-middle-aged mother of two older daughters and an infant son, Robert. She's married to a rich lawyer, Trey, who comes from a rich and powerful family. Things are pretty much OK for her, in other words. Until one morning she notices a witch outside the window of her house.

Well, it's not a witch. Turns out (later) that it's just an old unattractive lady. And later that day, the crone kidnaps little Robert, infant car seat and all, nearly right from under Bree's nose. Bree's understandably upset.

The purpose of Robert's abduction is to enmesh Bree in a twisty plot aimed at Trey's partner Spence. Bree goes along to save young Robert, but things don't turn out well at all. Bree teams up with the law firm's investigator, and her old friend, Marshall, to follow one tenuous lead after another in order to rescue Robert and discover the witch's evil motive.

The book grabbed me by the eyes; after scheduling a relatively leisurely 23 pages per day pace, I finished the last 160 pages in a single day.

The author's style is a tad overwritten and repetitive for me, but I can understand why people like that sort of thing. Didn't get in my way of liking the book.