Review: A Tenacious Investigator
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 04 8, 2012
I believe The Lies Have It is the third in Jill Edmondson's Sasha Jackson Mystery series. I've read and reviewed the first two, Dead Light District and Blood and Groom. I like Sasha. She's tenacious. She gets a case or two or three and she keeps working until she solves them. She doesn't zip around town in a red sports car having meetings with the rich and famous. She hoofs it or takes public transportation. She doesn't slip into an evening dress and glide into a celebrity ball unnoticed. She doesn't pretend to be something-- oh, wait a minute. She does dress appropriate to the occasion, like in The Lies Have It, which starts with Sasha working the bar at a fetish party at The Stealth Lounge.And from there, we follow her into places and lives both troubled and fascinating. Edmondson makes Toronto come alive on the page. She makes me want to go there. She brings even minor characters to life. Here's an example. This is from page 22. Sasha and a friend have been discussing one of the participants at the fetish party:I folded my arms across my chest, and pressed my knees closer together than words in a dictionary. Right now, I kind of wished I were wearing a medieval chastity belt.From that, you have no idea what or who has caused this reaction, but you know this may be a coming out party, but there are no debutantes attending. Some parts of The Lies Have It would probably be rated R, although not overly graphic. I figure that will entice as many buyers as it will scare away.Sasha tends to take the cases other investigators won't. And because she's willing to tromp around in grunge clothes, talk to street people, and go where others won't, she solves problems, she finds people, and she steps into situations that sometimes turn out very bad. But more of them turn out very good.The story moves fast. I would estimate the book is about 10 to 20 percent prose and the rest is dialogue. When Sasha works a case, she doesn't sit in an office. She's out on the streets finding answers and finding people.I give The Lies Have It and Sasha Jackson a rating of Hel-of-a-Character.