What do You think about Middle Of Nowhere (2005)?
Lou Boldt is one of the few at work in the Seattle police department which is suffering a collective 'sick out'. (This, apparently has nothing to do with the November WTO excitement…) And things are getting bad. One of the other working members of the department was viciously attacked in her home. Boldt, himself, was attacked at his home and there is a string of mysterious burglaries. Pearson truly captures Seattle which makes all of his books great fun for me, but the Boldt series, I think, holds up no matter where you are.
—Susan
The majority of the Seattle Police force is out with the "blue flu," an unofficial strike protesting the new Police Chief's mandate against earning overtime pay and restricting off-duty jobs. With the reduction of cops, only about one-fifth are signing in, crime is on the increase and it's the luck of the draw who works each case. That is how homicide detective, Lieutenant Lou Boldt ends up working a string of burglaries and why police psychologist Daphne Matthews draws lead on an assault case of fellow officer, Maria Sanchez, who is brutally attacked at her home and now lays paralyzed from a broken neck. The perpetrator sets the scene up so that the Sanchez case looks like a rape. But then, again, the television set is missing. Maybe, she surprised the burglar. It's either a "twisted burglar, or a greedy rapist" according to Detective Bobbie Gaynes. Neither MO feels right. Boldt and Matthews fear a "black hole." Then as the blue flu continues, there's this nagging question - was it cop against cop - unthinkable for a line of work that relies on each other for protection.Read the rest of my review here:http://mostlyfiction.com/sleuths/pear...
—Judi
The Blu Flu has the Seattle Police force divided. In the middle, still working is LT Boldt. He is trying to track down a burglar when his own colleagues start getting beating. This story is very twisted and has many different things going on at the same time. It really keeps you guessing and turning pages!The only issues I had with the story were the dialogue and the rambling. The author makes the dialogue between the characters feel stilted. I almost quit reading after the first chapter. What he left out of the conversations he put into the scenery and descriptions. The book has 499 pages which could have been less if they left out some of the lengthy descriptions. Example. The description of the cell phone tower tracking. I skimmed. All in all it was a really good story.
—Jeanette
