The Reading Jackalope

I spent the first two books of this series irritated with Joanne. I kept reading the books because I’d already purchased them. I’ve now read all of the series that I have and I will NOT be picking up the next book. I’m so far beyond done with this series and CE Murphy. I wasn’t quite so irritated with Joanne in this one, and I honestly thought this would be the book where the series picked up. And then I realized that no, this book was mostly a book where Joanne realizes she’s in love with her boss, there’s a plot beyond that but it’s mostly about the love thing. I wouldn’t have a problem with this except that she realizes this because she gets jealous, and that wouldn’t be so bad except the rival turns out to be the bad guy. So not only is the whole story about how Joanne realizes she’s in love (which anyone with eyes to read could see in book one) the rival for her love’s affection is evil. It gets so bad that there is a LITERAL CAT FIGHT over the body of this man. I would have thrown the book across the room at that point if it weren’t on my beloved kindle.

This would be bad enough, except that the big bad is actually in the bodies of two individuals, one of them Barb the female rival and the other is Barb’s twin brother Mark. Mark just so happens to have a thing with Joanne, because Joanne gets bitten by snakes on a frequent basis. Now here’s what really pissed me off and made sure I’d never read another book by Murphy again. Right after Joanne gets through beating up the evil Barb, Joanne then tries to heal Mark. Because Mark is an innocent and has been duped but Barb is knowingly evil and undeserving of being saved? I’m sorry that’s some misogynist BULLSHIT right there. Yes we later learn that Joanne freed Mark and Barb is still being possessed, it doesn’t change the writing choices that Murphy made. The book is basically how the good woman must fight for her man against the evil woman.

And then when you add in the fact that Joanne is not a ‘typically feminine’ woman (and GOD am I starting to hate that trope) and Barb is, the story becomes even uglier.