by Bonnie Meridieth

Created on: January 10, 2010

E is For Evidence is the first Sue Grafton novel I have read. I have another novel of hers, F Is For Fugitive, but I'm not entirely sure that I want to take the time to read it.

E is For Evidence is a mystery novel based on a case for private investigator Kinsey Milhone, who has been set up to take the fall as co-conspirator to arson and fraud.  Kinsey finds, while investigating an arson, that there has been a mistake made with her banking account.  Five thousand dollars worth of mistake to her favor.  This, in addition to swapped out police and inventory reports, lead the company she works for, California Fidelity, to believe that Kinsey is involved in a cover up involving a furniture company owned by old family friends.

Because the report that Kinsey turns in, based on her own investigation and the reports she read, indicated that the fire destroying Woods/Warren Furniture Company was an accident and not an arson, Kinsey became suspect in a major cover up.  She found out later that the reports she read were not the real reports.  The real reports pointed directly to arson.  After being put on leave from California Fidelity, Kinsey goes into business for herself, investigating the crimes she is being accused of.

During her journey, she is reunited with old family friends, becomes allies with enemies at California Fidelity, and her ex-husband suddenly reappears in her life, which is not something she is thrilled about.  Kinsey's dry sense of humor is something that I really enjoyed throughout this book.  She pops off with comments that make you laugh and be able to relate to her.

E has great potential for a story line, it just didn't live up to it's potential.   I thought that there was so much description of every detail around Kinsey, that it took away from the story itself. In the parts, such as the end, when there was a lot of things going on around her, the book moved along and I didn't want to put it down. The majority of it, however, was so detailed that I had a hard time keeping my eyes open.

It also seemed that none of the pieces of this story fit until the very end, when the family matriarch actually spelled it out for you.  Even then, her story pointed toward the person who was killing people, but not necessarily toward any wrong doings at the Woods/Warren warehouse. It just didn't come together for me.

I'm intrigued by Sue Grafton's books enough that I might want to give another one a try.  I do hope that it's more enthralling than E Is For Evidence, however. It just simply fell short of my expectations of a mystery novel.

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