Ever Read a Book You Heard was Great and it wasn't?

Today's blog is about a series of mystery books that I've heard a lot of great things about, so I thought I would finally give them a try. As you could guess from the headline of the blog, I was disappointed. The author won a lot of accolades for her long running series. Perhaps I just read the only one in the series that seemed to take a long time to get to the mystery. I also couldn't relate to, or get interested in the characters.  Today's blog is about my read of it. 

It's called "The Cat Who Tailed a Thief," and I'll leave the author's name out of this blog since she passed away in 2011. 

I usually give books 50 pages to draw me in, especially if they are 250 pages (That's 20% of the book read)... but I read up to page 75. 

   The book had about 15-20 different characters and it was way too many to keep track of, or develop an interest in any of them. The lead character is a newspaper reporter with 2 cats, one who had some strange affinity to solve mysteries... but the murder didn't happen until page 70, and I didn't know much about the victim and thus, I didn't care about him. Maybe I'm being too critical... but I'm used to mysteries where the characters are set up in the first 2 chapters and the murder happens within or by chapter 3 or so. 

I really, really wanted to like this book and read more in the series, but...

I stopped reading at page 75. 

I'm not motivated to read another unless someone can recommend one. 

ABOUT THE BOOK: Jim Qwilleran—along with his lovable Siamese cats Koko and Yum Yum—follows a trail of clues as elusive as a cat burglar in the night in this mystery in the New York Times bestselling series.

There’s been a rash of petty thievery in Pickax—ever since banker Willard Carmichael and his flashy young wife, Danielle, moved in. But now Willard’s been killed in a mugging Down Below…or so it seems. Qwill’s suspicious, especially when Willard’s house-restoration project in Pickax falls into the hands of Danielle’s cousin—whose rich new wife then dies on her honeymoon! The clues are confounding. But with Koko’s help, Qwill intends to catch a thief—and a killer...