A beset blogger seeks solace in cyberspace in this slapdash effort from bestseller Jance (Dead Wrong, 2006, etc.). Up to now, Ali Reynolds, of Cutlooseblog.com, has been the designated caregiver for her unseen cyberfriends, but suddenly, she's the one who needs emotional support. Not only does she face the challenge of divorcing a cheating husband, but the louse gets himself murdered, and Ali is labeled prime suspect. No way, chorus Cutloose fans. Way, counter the cops. She had motive and opportunity, they insist, even though these may strike readers who aren't on Jance's police force as thin and unconvincing. In self-defense, Ali turns detective, returning as a visitor to the house she once shared with TV exec Paul Reynolds before he became first a cheater, then a corpse. The chatelaine of the moment is beautiful, vapid young April Gaddis, eight months pregnant by Paul, who has her own reasons for being disenchanted with him--reasons the laggardly LAPD hasn't bothered to examine. When April's termagant mother meets an unlamented end, shoved down a staircase by person or persons unknown, the cops, indifferent to Ali's alibi, like her for that one, too. Troubled and distracted, Ali still refuses to shirk her blogging responsibilities, checking in from time to time to reassure the good folks "only a click away" that "Cutloose is back in business." Plotloose. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

At the start of bestseller Jance's uninspired second Ali Reynolds thriller (after Edge of Evil), Ali's husband, Paul Grayson, is killed on the eve of their divorce-by a train that hits the car where he's tied up in the trunk somewhere near Palm Springs, Calif. Ali, Paul's legal beneficiary, becomes the chief murder suspect. A popular blogger and former Los Angeles TV news anchor who's suing the station where she used to work for wrongful dismissal, Ali initiates her own investigation, enlisting the help of her mother, grown son Chris and high school friend Dave Holman, a homicide detective in Sedona, Ariz., where Ali now lives. In a series of clumsy plot developments involving Paul's fianc?e, April Gaddis, and April's greedy mother, Monique Ragsdale, Ali learns that Paul was financing a performance variety of the sumo sudoku puzzle fad. Full of endless blogs and superficial characters, this one will disappoint fans of Jance's expertly written and paced Joanna Brady and J.P. Beaumont mysteries. (Jan.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved