Loyalty

De: Ingrid Thoft

Narrado por: Rebecca Soler

The Ludlows are a hard-charging family, and patriarch Carl Ludlow treats his offspring like employees—which they are. But his daughter, Fina, is a bit of a black sheep. A law school dropout, her father keeps her in the fold as the firm’s private investigator, working alongside her brothers.

Juggling her family of high-powered (and highly dysfunctional) attorneys, the cops and Boston’s criminal element is usually something Fina does without breaking a sweat. But when her sister-in-law disappears, she’s caught up in a case unlike any she’s encountered before.

Carl wants things resolved without police interference, but the deeper Fina digs, the more impossible that seems. The Ludlows close ranks, and her brother Rand and his unruly teenage daughter Haley grow mysteriously distant from the family. As Fina unearths more dirt, the demands of family loyalty intensify. But Fina is after the truth—no matter the cost.

Reseñas de la Crítica

“Loyalty’s Fina Ludlow is my hero. If I were in a bad spot, I’d want her at my back. Don’t miss it.”—Catherine Coulter, # 1 New York Times bestselling author

“In her debut novel, Ingrid Thoft gives us Fina Ludlow, the newest private eye to prowl Boston’s mean streets. Fina returns the female detective to the heart of the hard-boiled tradition: hard-drinking, hard-loving, moody. Writer Ingrid Thoft has given her a dysfunctional extended family that rivals the Ewings of Dallas fame, which adds a dimension not often seen in the PI novel.”—Sara Paretsky, New York Times bestselling author

“Loyalty, Ingrid Thoft’s strong debut, is gripping, and Fina Ludlow, the black sheep of her male-dominated family of ambulance chasers, elevates it to a must-read. A seductive combination of sass and smarts, Fina reminds us just how hard it is for women in a male-dominated world without ever giving an inch. Loyalty reminds me just how great a PI novel can be. This is the start of something big.”—Ridley Pearson, New York Times bestselling author

"What starts, in Thoft’s dazzling first novel, as a missing-persons case for Boston PI Fina Ludlow—the search for her sister-in-law, Melanie—swells through layers of familial secrets, lies, and betrayals to something approaching Greek tragedy....Readers will be eager to see more of smash-mouth Fina, a hard-boiled throwback equally comfortable shooting from the hip or the lip."
— Publishers Weekly (starred)

“Thoft’s promising debut introduces a significantly flawed but tough new PI and offers up compelling suspense, while the smooth prose keeps things moving right along….This mystery wrapped in family drama should please fans of contemporary suspense of the more hard-boiled sort.”
— Library Journal

“(Fina) Ludlow has the shrewdness of her parents and siblings but she has compassion, too. Fans of the Kinsey Millhone mysteries will enjoy this engaging debut.”
— Booklist

The amount of food the main character could consume.

the story started out rather slow and i almost quit listening. However I persisted and as it turned out I really enjoyed the book.

Bought Book 2 before this one was over

GREAT! I loved her and the story and the narrator. I am downloading Book 2 in this series right now and hope that Book 3, which is already written, is recorded this week!!

Masochistic Fina

I enjoyed parts of Loyalty, set in the Boston area and the main character Fina. The author Ingrid Thoft has a wicked sense of humor and a knack for snappy dialogue. If only Ingrid had spent as much time & energy developing Fina's personality as she did recounting Fina's junk food diet.

While I loved Fina's strength and determination, I winced when she was reckless, diving into dangerous situations without using her brains or common sense. I admired her devotion to her brothers, sister-in-laws, nieces and nephews. However, I found it totally ridiculous that Fina, a successful private investigator, worked mostly for her cold hearted father.

Daddy Carl was a sociopath, only interested in earning money and getting good publicity for his law firm. He didn't have an ounce of human kindness or compassion, not caring when Fina was injured several times on the job. It made no sense that Fina, as an adult, would take cruel insults and endless grief from Carl (without shooting him).

Note to author: don't create an intelligent, headstrong character, then have that person act masochistic and irrational.

Strong investigator enmeshed in dysfunctional family

Fina is definitely a feisty investigator who stops at nothing as she eats and drinks her way to partially solving the case. Her family is so cruel and perverse that I don’t really understand why she wants to be accepted by them. Way too many meals vividly described. Claustrophobic. I think they all need time away from each other.