When Victoria Comstock is brutally murdered by a spear in her lavish home, there are unfortunately more suspects than one can count. Though beautiful, charismatic, and wealthy, Victoria had a nasty habit of using people and then destroying their lives. The odd thing is that most of the men she destroyed still love her. A fellow book reviewer said that Victoria makes Damien in The Omen look like Billy Graham, and I’m going to have to agree. Detectives Barbara Lassiter and Susan Martinez are living the difficult double life of woman and detective in Albuquerque. With coworkers that constantly harass them, things are already tough enough. Barbara deals with a drinking problem after the loss of her husband and Susan deals with a semi-abusive ex on the regular. In short, before the Comstock case lands in their laps, they are already two very stressed out women. With Albuquerque high society closing in and demanding results, Barbara and Susan both are working their hardest to get accurate results and quickly. With too many suspects, and not enough evidence, the case looks grim before taking a dramatic turn.
Joseph Badal’s Borderline is fast-paced, interesting, and provides satisfying results. Barbara and Susan are both highly intelligent and have good instincts. The crime itself is fascinating, as are the main players in the story. My only real issues here have to do with mental health and plot device. I’d like to point out that Victoria Comstock’s killer was a brilliant choice on author Joseph Badal’s part.
I do have a few concerns about Borderline. There are a few plot lines that would have been better left unsaid. Barbara is still recovering from her husband’s death and multiple times it is mentioned that she suffers both from an addiction to alcohol and is overweight. She begins a weight loss regimen that I frankly have to point out is impossible. She loses several pounds in a very short period of time, which blew me away and also highly distracts from the story at hand. This also plays into another plot point which is so far off the mark of where we should be with women now a days that I don’t even want to address it. The other major issue Borderline suffers from is a complete lack of sympathy for folks with Borderline Personality Disorder. The book focuses on Victoria’s issues with the disorder and makes it appear that all people with BPD are utter monsters; not true and highly dangerous to the world of mental health issues.
Still, Badal’s Borderline is an engaging read that I finished very quickly on audio book. It’s the type of book that keeps you coming back, if only to find out what the next twist in the story will be. The audio reading by Pamela Almand was absolutely wonderful. She does fantastic voice work and really keeps the story moving along. I loved her inflection and hope to hear more audiobooks with her voice talents soon.
Borderline by Joseph Badal is now available.
