Blind Fish Don't Talk

A Julia Fairchild Mystery

By: P. J. Peterson

Narrated by: Johanna Agnew

A professional diver is found dead in an underwater cave. Although the death is classified as accidental, Julia isn't as sure and investigates on her own. Will she find a murderer or is she next on the list?

©2018 P. J. Peterson (P)2022 P. J. Peterson

Mystery in the Caribbean

We find ourselves in the beautiful Caribbean where Dr. Fairchild is vacationing but before she can relax, she must deliver something to someone for her boyfriend.
The individual that she has been looking for turns up murdered and this is where Dr. Fairchild amateur sleuthing ensues.
The premise is interesting but unfortunately I wasn’t able to connect with the character. I found her confusing and questioned a lot of her poor decisions. It was just hard because she’s a Dr- but yet she threw caution to the wind. A lot of instances, I had to suspend disbelief. I’m also not a fan of cheating and I was very confused with the MC behavior.
The narrator, Johanna Agnew was okay. While the narrator used a variety of tones, some of the inflections were not. Not sure if I struggled with the narration as well because I had a dislike for the MC.

Hard to get through

Ok, hear me out…

The narrator did a great job overall.

However, the story itself was hard to get through. I found myself shaking my head and facepalms were plenty. There was WAY too much suspended belief used to get through the whole thing. The main character was completely daft. Who doesn’t report break ins, threatening notes, or vehicular assaults? Our main character that’s who. Cheating is not my thing and our lovely doctor found herself attracted to any man that gave her a moments worth of attention AND engaged in returning flirting with kissing while. she. waited. for. her boyfriend. to arrive on the island.

The mystery was ok. You did question the suspect of everyone involved. But the big reveal felt rushed in the end. It would have been a DNF but I had to see it through because I wanted to see it play out.

twisted cover ups and greed

Holy moly what a twisted path!! This had me on the edge of my seat hoping for the best. I kept trying to guess at the bad guys but I was way off base with my guesses. Suspenseful to the end. I voluntarily listened to a free copy of this and am giving an honest review. The narrator did a good job bringing it to life.

Painful to listen to

As an avid SCUBA diver and cave diver, I was excited to find a mystery novel that featured my hobby. I didn't expect the details about the technical diving to be accurate- they rarely are. But, I didn't expect them to be so bad. Scuba tanks have not had a J valve (to pull to release an emergency supply of air) for at least 40 years. And, somehow the tanks were sabotaged by the removal or substitution of a cotter pin. A cotter pin? The open water divers just blissfully entered "the cave" with no safety concerns. Oh, and the blind cave fish was swimming about on the reef. But, the main thing that bothered me was that the protagonist seemed determined to flirt with/sleep with every man she encountered despite being in a relationship that's serious enough that her boyfriend paid for her vacation. I couldn't help disliking her.