Summary: A suburban housewife and her two friends find out that their neighborhood struggles (PTA, school year books, crazy neighbors, etc) all might be connected to a much deeper problem than they could have expected.
I am very careful with my purchases of books. Because I aways have a few (hundred) books that I could fall back to reading from my library, I tend to only buy books when they are on sale or I really have a specific interest. But I also tend to always pick up free Audible credits or promotional books. Recently there was a $10 promotional credit for Audible. And I used it to buy audio companions to books that I already had on Kindle, but I had not ever gotten around to reading. I try to be adventurous because after all I didn’t pay for the credit, I might as well go out of my standard reading practice.
As I have said recently, nothing lately has really been pricking my interest. Usually when I get in this mood I need to find something funny.
Citizen Insane was billed as a funny cozy mystery. It is about Barb, a suburban housewife, mother of three and wife of an FBI agent that is a dead ringer for George Clouney. This is the second book in a series (didn’t realize that when I picked it up, but the first book, Take the Monkeys and Run is free on Kindle). The books in this series are relatively short (less than 200 pages) and funny (almost farcical) look at suburban life.
Everyone knows everyone’s business, no one seems that worried about money, there are quirky characters pretty much on every page. Barb is trying to be a good mom, and wife (although she kicked her husband out because in a previous book she found out that there is a whole history to his life that he neglected to tell her and so she wants him to date her again and win her love back again.) She is a good friend to her two quirky friends and even the neighbor that she is not so hot on, but seems to need her.
I thought I knew what was going on throughout the book almost from the beginning, but I was wrong. I did predict some of the ways things would work out, but not the main arc of the story. I have started enjoying mysteries more recently. But I am still not really all that interested in the actual mystery (I am not one that tries to figure everything out), but I am more interested in the characters and motivations and the overall development of the story.
Citizen Insane will not be mistaken for great literature, but it was a good fun (and quick) read and I did enjoy it. I picked up the first book in the series and there are several more that are all reasonably priced that I might pick up later.
Citizen Insane Purchase Links: Paperback, Kindle Edition, Audible.com Audiobook
