Veena’s review of Deeper Than the Dead (Vera Boyett, Book 1) by Debra Webb
Romantic Suspense published by Thomas and Mercer 01 Aug 24
The story starts out slow, but then it picks up the pace and it seems like you’re running to catch up to all the little clues and twists and turns. Unfortunately, it becomes a bit convoluted before the grand finale.
Vera Boyett is seeing her life she’s built crumbling around her, when she receives a panicked call from her sister Eve, that has her racing to her childhood home where she hasn’t visited in a long time. A body was found on her family’s land, the body of her stepmother Sheree, her stepsister Luna’s mother, who had supposedly left her daughter and husband and disappeared. Well, clearly, she didn’t go anywhere, since she was found dead and hidden. It’s also clear that Eve and Luna have somehow been complicit or know about the hidden dead body. Then to their shock and dismay, three other dead bodies are found, all females.
As Vera and the police chief rekindle their romance, Vera uses her CSU skills to help solve the mystery. The siblings have a lot of stress and strain in their relationship – will they figure out a way to be a family again? How will solving the murders of the hidden bodies impact the small town and the people who live there? Just when you think you know the answers, the author takes you on a pivot that has you grasping at straws. The truth is stranger than fiction and you just have to take it on faith.
Grade: B
Summary:
Crime analyst and newly disgraced deputy police chief Vera Boyett doesn’t visit home often, and she certainly doesn’t venture back into the cave on her family land. But when the remains of her long-missing stepmother are discovered, Vera will have to face a past that threatens all she is.
She and her sister Eve had a fairy-tale childhood: good until it was tragic, with a stepmother they never found a bond with. At least they had each other, a baby half-sister, and a mutual devotion that would have them do the unthinkable.
It’s a summer in small-town Tennessee, so thick with humidity it could drown you and so rife with secrets it could smother you. And deep beneath the surface, there are more bodies than you’d think…
