Death by Jealousy

“Death by Jealousy” is Jaden Skye’s sixth book in the Caribbean Murder series. Cindy and Mattheus, the detective team throughout the series, are off again on another case, this time to the Cayman Islands where a bride-to-be has disappeared the night before her wedding during a night dive in the ocean. The mother of the groom, Peter, frantically calls Cindy begging her and Mattheus to fly immediately to the Caymans to help in the search for the bride, Allie. Cindy and Mattheus are still reeling after their last case during which Mattheus learned the fate of his missing wife, and it also hits close to home with Cindy.

Death by Honeymoon (Book #1 in the Caribbean Murder Series)

The story centers around the search for Allie and what was going on in her life that might have been factors in her disappearance. During the investigation, Mattheus and Cindy are also on the outs from time to time as a handsome friend of the groom’s family tries to wine and dine Cindy, and a beautiful wedding guest is attracted to Mattheus.

As in all of the Caribbean Murder series books, I was kept reading because of the suspense of the story and interest in finding out whodunit. The two characters of Cindy and Mattheus are people I always care about in the books. Cindy’s courage and integrity make her a character that I admire.

The editing is still a problem with this author’s books, though. The last name of the groom’s family starts out as McPherson, but a chapter or so later it turns into McPharlen and stays that way. A host of other errors crop up, too, and I can’t imagine a book that has been edited winding up with so many mistakes. The story is good, but I can’t give it more than three stars after six books with the same editing problems with no improvement.

The only thing that kept me reading this book to conclusion was that I was counting the typographical errors. The story premises, a missing bride on a Caribbean Island had caught my eye. That it is #6 in a series, makes me wonder how bad the other five could be. The story was filled with thoroughly unlikeable characters, especially the two main ones Cindy and Mattheus whose personal problems totally overshadowed the story line. By the time Cindy was in grave danger, I was rooting for the villain just to put me out of my misery.

Cindy and Mattheus are private detectives. They have been called to the Cayman Islands to investigate a missing and presumed dead bride. The case becomes very convoluted and people are pitted against each other. The writing is good but the spelling, grammar, and wording mistakes are fairly frequent and detract from the flow of the story. The characters are nicely portrayed, easy to identify with and care about. I enjoyed the second half of the has more than the first half. If you enjoy a good mystery I think you will like this story.

Perhaps Jaden Skye is finally listening to the Amazon reviews as this book was not as fraught with appalling typos as her other books. Skye is a decent storyteller, and dialogue is a strength. Unfortunately Book 8 was also loaded with typos, which prompted my first review. The books published later than this one are not necessarily edited.

I understand it’s a hassle to re-upload a corrected manuscript to Amazon, so many authors don’t bother. But Skye’s previously released books are so laden with typos and grammatical errors, it’s a struggle to read them. I can handle a few errors, but not as many as Skye has let loose onto the ebook realm. So, it’s still buyer beware.

However, this particular edition seems to be fairly blemish free. Amazon will refund ebooks that you don’t like, so I suggest that if you do download one of the unedited novels, demand a refund. Perhaps Skye will get the message and revamp them all.

Since the author is recycling a storyline and basic plot over and over again, the real story is about the protagonist. Death by Honeymon, the first in the series, is free, but loaded with errors. Characters are flat, but it’s often a lively, shallow read. Escape fiction, each story is set on different Caribbean islands.

This is the first book in this series that I have read and I was thrilled to find another mystery writer that I enjoy reading. I will be buying more books in this series because they are so well written and the characters spring to life in such a way that you almost feel as if you are in the Caribbean. A few grammatical errors, usually tense based, but overall, not too distracting. Really liked the interaction between the two detectives.

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