Review: Raining Men and Corpses

Raining Men and Corpses by Anne R. Tan
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

2.5 stars

I read this for the Terror in a Small Town square for Halloween Bingo.

Someone was in the house. Raina tiptoed around the car to the side door. The rushing noise in her ears competed with her uneven breaths. Her clammy hands gripped the doorknob. She twisted and pulled. The door scraped against the concrete floor, ripping through the silence. It opened an inch. Gooseflesh peppered her arms.

This is first in a series that looks to follow along with Raina as she amateur sleuths her way through situations and her detective ex-husband Matthew tries to get her to mind her own business. There relationship was completely mystifying as the most we get about Matthew is he has gold flecked eyes, thinks he will snap one day because his dad was an alcoholic, and wants Raina to stay out of murder cases. Told from Raina's point of view we get statements here and there about how Matthew and her were childhood sweethearts, married, he left her cuffed and naked in a hotel room in Rome, and their marriage was annulled in Vegas. Again, this first in series, which all these little statements dropped here and there, I kept checking to make sure I didn't miss a beginning novella or something; I felt so lost in regards to their relationship.

The murder mystery had great red herrings but it was a bit overshadowed by how I kept being baffled how so many were disregarding/disrespecting the police and investigation. No one seems to be telling the police the truth and some officers seem to be ok messing up an investigation because of personal feelings. This along with not getting a pov from Matthew and him using believable procedure for the investigation, gave the story more of a chik-lit murder mystery farce.

Raina and the cast of characters including her grandmother and friend Eden, were enjoyable to follow along with for the afternoon but I needed more details to explained connections to really immerse myself in the story.

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