Review: It missed its mark
Rating: 2 out of 5
Date: 12 16, 2012
I'm sad to say Voodoo or Die, the sequel to Stephanie Bond's In Deep Voodoo, missed its mark.At the end of Voodoo or Die, there were so many potential mysteries that could've been made great stories for a sequel, but instead Bond chose to push those stories aside in favor of introducing a new main character and a new plot.Voodoo or Die centers around Penny's lawyer, Gloria Dalton, who has just moved to Mojo to take over Deke's law practice. Little does everyone know that Gloria Dalton is actually Lori Lawson, who was placed in the witness protection program when she was a kid after thugs killed her father. She thinks a small-town life will be a nice change from New Orleans, but keeping her identity a secret proves difficult in a town like Mojo. Especially when her paralegal is killed and the new police chief is no other than the boy - now a man - who she loved before being whisked away into the witness protection program.The plot just wasn't that interesting. It seemed like most people were being cagey for the sake of being cagey. It's been a few days since I finished this, and I can't even remember who killed the paralegal.What I do remember, however, is that Gloria annoyed the crap out of me. I couldn't sympathize with her, and part of that may be because she had enough sympathy for herself to go around. If I had to read one more page about how she fell in love with the police chief (seriously, I can't even remember his name) when they were kids and she is struggling between wanting to tell him who she really is but not wanting to compromise her safety. I get that might be a difficult thing to face, but she went on and on and on about it. At some point, it's like make up your freaking mind. There were options - perhaps trying to date the police chief without giving away her identity or, here's a thought, he's a freaking police chief (with a good record), maybe he could keep your identity a secret?Really, Gloria spent most of the book cowering at everything. She wasn't funny. She wasn't witty. She wasn't particularly smart (especially for someone who was a lawyer). She didn't have the makings of a strong character - not like Penny.And the "surprise" ending (I say this because it came out of nowhere) was a little too perfect. I love happy endings, but this was just too much. I won't give it away, but I will say it's something that Gloria would've had to be a dimwit not to notice before.I'm not sure if there are any more books coming out in this series, but I definitely will preview them first to make sure they don't turn out like this one. I'd love to see more Penny, less Gloria.