[.ca] Breach of Duty: A J.P. Beaumont Mystery (ISBN 0380974061)

From Amazon.com:
In Breach of Duty, after a three year hiatus, J.A. Jance resumes her Seattle-based mystery series featuring homicide detective Jonas Piedmont Beaumont. The novel begins on Lake Chelan (in eastern Washington State) as Beau scatters his grandfather's ashes in the water. The reflective moment offers Jance a perfect opportunity to get new readers up to speed with her hero (and offers a quick refresher course for the many ongoing Jance fans). Beau has struggled through a hard life of alcoholism and two failed marriages, but now, just maybe, he's pulled things together. After his return to Seattle, his new partner, Sue Danielson, bombards him with two cases and a number of leads. A 67-year-old woman named Agnes Ferman burned to death in her bed. After $300,000 was discovered in her garage, the police rightly began to suspect murder. At almost the same time, a group of teenagers discovered the long-dead body of a Native American man--possibly connected to recent hate crime. Sue and Beau plunge into both cases while they begin to learn a bit more about each other. One of the pleasures of Beau's narrative is his constant, unspoken (and often hilariously sarcastic) asides to the reader. Meanwhile, Beau's sensitivity to Sue and her personal struggles suggest great promise for this couple. In the end, a diverse collection of oddball characters, a comprehensive sense of Seattle and environs, and a strong pairing of mystery plots make this another winning installment in Jance's much-beloved series. The tale of J.P. Beaumont began with Until Proven Guilty in 1985, and has included award-winners Without Due Process and Failure to Appear among its 14 books. --Patrick O'Kelley

Native American giver.:
Breach of duty is the story of a disillusioned police detective named, J.P. Beaumont, a male detective from a squad in the Seattle Police Department. Beaumont, besides being a little on the shop-worn side, has a problem with authority, mostly in the form of a newly appointed squad commander jumped up from below Beaumont in seniority. Beaumont also has a reputation as a jinx whose partners seem to get killed with alarming regularity. Does a lot of this sound slightly over-used in recent day crime fiction? Jance, in this novel (as well as in this series, no doubt,) undertakes a degree of difficulty that many writers simply shun. She writes a detective series in the first person of a male central character...In the episode titled Breach Of Duty Vance pushes Beaumont through a number of events that have no special intensity, but the plot surrounding two separate investigations and a goodly dose of Native American mumbo jumbo is intriguing enough in itself to allow for continued interest in spite of the lackluster action. The character of the squad commander comes across as woefully one dimensional, This self serving, untalented martinet who badgers Beaumont's every move is a stick figure antagonist created for the purpose of providing conflict...the author, who never gives us a fully developed image at which to aim our righteous indignation. Beaumont's partner is a woman with two young boys at home and her hostile former husband serves as a wild card in the mix...Breach OF Duty is crime drama for the faithful, but not for the seeker of truly powerful fiction. It does however, manage to keep one reading until one finds out who did what to whom and why. In this fundamental requisite of the mystery genre, Vance does not fail the reader. Even if the events are less than eventful in the story, the author provides the mandatory level of intricacy in the weaving of the plot. I found it quite readable, even though the book lacks depth in places and wants for more engaging action. Gary Souza

Jance does it again:
In a word: Wonderful! All of JA Jance's books are page turners all the way up to the end, and this one is no exception. You will find yoruself enthralled with this one. If you haven't read any of her other work, start with the Seattle series, but read them all!

Hopefully not the last of this series:
In this 14th. book in the J. P. Beaumont series, Beau and his partner Sue Danielson are investigating two separate cases. In the first one, an elderly women is found burned in her bed. Hints of blackmail and jealousy are turned up in the course of the investigation. The problem is deciding which one was the actual motive for the murder. The second case has to do with the bones of an Indian shaman which are discovered in a public park by some satanic, role-playing teenagers. There are many false leads and strange tales of fatal Indian curses which begin to have some basis in reality. In addition to working on these cases with Beau, Sue is dealing with an abusive ex-husband who is wooing their children with promises of a trip to Disneyland. When things don't go his way, he explodes into anger which effects both Sue and Beau in a life-changing series of events. This book has all the ingredients of a good mystery story, along with a developing relationship between two of its main characters. Faithful readers hope that Jance will continue this series with Beaumont headed in a new direction both professionally and personally.

Breach of Duty:
I am another disappointed reader of this book, it was enjoyable up until the ending. I have enjoyed the P J Beaumont series in the pass and like it when a series comes out that you can follow along with, but this "Diry Harry" syndrome of always loosing or having the partner eliminated serves no purpose in my estimation outside of frustrating me. Having one's partner "done in" may be a-fact-of-life, but continually? I will try her again since I like the P J Beaumont series but, next time I think I will skip to the end and see who dies before I purchase or read the book.

A GUTCHECK FOR J.P.:
This is at the same time the best and worst J.P. Beaumont novel I have read. During the course of trying to untangle two cases at the same time, several things happen which alter his life. I won't go into details, that would ruin the book for you, but this book is a must for Beaumont fans. I have read some reviews which speculate that J.P. won't be back, but I believe differently. He will be back, maybe as a tougher, smarter, changed J.P., but he will be back. I can't wait.