Sue Grafton ups the ante for private investigator Kinsey Millhone like never before in this “taut, terrifying, transfixing” #1 New York Times bestselling mystery in the Alphabet series.Kinsey Millhone’s elderly neighbor, Gus Vronsky, may have been the original inspiration for the term “Grumpy Gus.” A miser and a hoarder, Gus is so crotchety that after he takes a bad fall, his only living relative … bad fall, his only living relative is anxious to find someone to take care of him and get back home as soon as she can.
To help, Kinsey runs a check on the applicant, Solana Rojas. Social security, driver’s license, nursing certification: It all checks out. And it sounds like she did a good job for her former employers. So Kinsey gives her the thumbs-up, figuring Gus will be the ideal assignment for this diligent, experienced caregiver.
And the real Solana Rojas was indeed an excellent caregiver. But the woman who has stolen her identity is not, and for her, Gus will be the ideal victim…
“The best and strongest book in the series…Solana is one of the most evil, calculating characters Grafton has created.”—USA Today
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I am a big fan of Kinsey Millhone! She’s tough, hard working and thoroughly enjoyable. I was hooked from the very first Sue Grafton book that I read.
I know I read it several years ago, but it was so bland that I don’t remember a thing about it.
Great writer.
I loved all of Sue Grafton’s books!
Wonderful series of books! Have enjoyed every single one!
I have read all of Sue Grafton’s books from A to Z and have love everyone of them. She was my go to author when I needed an entertaining as well as intriguing mystery with main characters I grew to love. I miss her lovely writings.
Every Kinsey Milhone story has been a winner for me. Great series!
Sue Grafton makes the characters in her books come to life!
good read
Entire series is worth the read.
Love this series, the storyline s well-developed and well-researched. The heroine’s investigative skills are “outside the box”!
I have become so well acquainted with Kinsey Milhone, the main character in all the Sue Grafton books, and her neighbor Henry, her landlord and a retired baker.Kinsey always finds trouble even in what she expects to be the most mundane cases. I am always looking forward to the next Sue Grafton book as soon as I finish her most recently released novel. Start with A is for. . .
i’ve enjoyed the entire series
Once again, our favorite P.I. is at the top of her game! I thoroughly enjoyed this book and highly recommend it to current fans of Sue Grafton AND to those other readers who haven’t yet experienced and enjoyed following the life and cases of Kinsey Milhone!! PM
I have enjoyed all of her books and I like the way the characters are carried from one book to the next but you don’t have to read them in order.
I have read all of her books which I wouldn’t have done it I didn’t like her.
I’ve been reading this series for a long time now. Twenty books into the series. It started out well, flagged for a bit, and then regained itself. It has steadily improved for the past few installments. All that to tell you: this has been the best one yet.
What I liked about “T is for Trespass”:
The format – After this many books, you come to expect a certain protocol from a series. This can straddle a dangerous line between comfortable and stagnant. Ms Grafton took a slightly different angle for this book. Instead of Kinsey being called in to solve a case of some sort, the perpetrator and motive being the wildcards as the storyline unfolded, this time the case was happening in real time, the “bad guy” was not a mystery, and we actually know more than Kinsey does as we’re privileged to have some chapters narrated by the villain. It was a fresh perspective and served the story well.
I was on the edge of my seat – There were times it felt as if the plot might stall, but given that there needed to be a lot of patience by all parties in their revolving cat-and-mouse roles, it seemed to be a necessary evil. By the final third of the book, the suspense had me feeling like an elephant sat on my chest, my heart was actually racing, and I could not turn the pages fast enough. It had early Mary-Higgins-Clark-creep factor and plenty of twists.
The topic was relevant but I haven’t found it widely used – Focusing on (these are not spoilers as these details are revealed in the first 15 pages of the book) elder abuse, identity theft, and mental terror, this was the sort of case that appears far too frequently in the evening news and always leaves a sense of revulsion and disgust. Those same feelings were generated by the story, making it feel believable.
A truly dislike-able adversary – There was nothing about her that left me with any misplaced sympathy for personal circumstances. She was a sociopath to a degree that left me entirely unnerved.
A human side of Kinsey – So often, Kinsey holds herself a bit aloof, but here we see her guard down and a caring side of her that rarely (if ever) has surfaced. I think it made her more vulnerable which only contributed to success of the story-telling.
What I didn’t care for:
Only partial resolution – I’m nitpicking here, because the primary case is resolved well. However, there were multiple smaller cases occurring throughout the book as Kinsey worked on other jobs and somehow those resolutions seemed more afterthought, and because I was invested in the entire book, I didn’t feel as satisfied with the way they were considered wrapped up.
For a series I nearly quit at roughly the halfway point, I have no regrets about pushing on with it anyway. I can only hope that the remaining five books can somehow live up to the bar this one has set so that the series can go out without disappointing. What will you get into next, Kinsey Millhone? And how will the repercussions of what you’ve dealt with over these past couple of months linger with you?
Love every book in this series!
I miss Sue Grafton. She’s the author who first started my love of female heroines in the “less bloody” genre.
Always love Sue Grafton. Have read all of them. So sorry she passed away.