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A review by amym84
Moorewood Family Rules by HelenKay Dimon
4.0
After the death of her mother, Jillian Moorewood tried in vain to get her family of grifters to go legit. Things definitely don't go to plan, and the story begins with Jillian returning to her family estate after spending 39 months in prison. But if there's one thing that Jillian knows, it's how to pull a long con. Unbeknownst to her family, Jillian has returned with a few surprises, but she's not fully prepared for how much her family is determined to hold on to the lives they've built. Enter, Beck Romer a security specialist hired to keep Jillian safe from her family. It's hard to know who to trust in the Moorewood household, but Jillian and Beck form a strong working relationship that will hopefully carry Jillian through the upcoming confrontation. That is, if the person who ratted her out in the first place, isn't set on sending her back to prison for good.
I was very interested in reading this book when I found out it would be about a family of criminals and the seemingly one family member who is trying to go legit. I think I was prepared for a lot more scams and cons, these things are all there, but almost in the peripheral. Down to its most basic premise, this story is about a dysfunctional family.
We kind of start the story on the other side of all the cons (although really Jillian's family seems to be in a constant con if not with someone else than with each other). We're seeing this family after years and years of crime. The breaking point for Jillian was the death of her mother. Her mother who, despite everything, loved Jillian's father. She always wanted the family to turn honest. It was her dying wish that Jillian has been trying to uphold when she's sent to prison.
Seeing this family with all the baggage and how they navigate around one another was very relatable. I think we all, at certain times or another, will clash with our relatives (probably not over crime, but still).
The pacing of the book was one that I had to get used to. There's a lot of bantering and back-and-forth between the family and having an understanding of the characters helped pick up on the tone of the story. It's very quirky and it's funny without specifically trying to be just as we see the lengths in which certain Moorewoods are willing to go in order to in order keep up the con. The lies in which they live everyday in order to assure themselves that what they're doing is not wrong.
While not exactly what I was expecting, I thought that this book was a lot of fun. I enjoyed the family interactions and I think the whole idea, the thing that this family is really good at, is shattering expectations.
I was very interested in reading this book when I found out it would be about a family of criminals and the seemingly one family member who is trying to go legit. I think I was prepared for a lot more scams and cons, these things are all there, but almost in the peripheral. Down to its most basic premise, this story is about a dysfunctional family.
We kind of start the story on the other side of all the cons (although really Jillian's family seems to be in a constant con if not with someone else than with each other). We're seeing this family after years and years of crime. The breaking point for Jillian was the death of her mother. Her mother who, despite everything, loved Jillian's father. She always wanted the family to turn honest. It was her dying wish that Jillian has been trying to uphold when she's sent to prison.
Seeing this family with all the baggage and how they navigate around one another was very relatable. I think we all, at certain times or another, will clash with our relatives (probably not over crime, but still).
The pacing of the book was one that I had to get used to. There's a lot of bantering and back-and-forth between the family and having an understanding of the characters helped pick up on the tone of the story. It's very quirky and it's funny without specifically trying to be just as we see the lengths in which certain Moorewoods are willing to go in order to in order keep up the con. The lies in which they live everyday in order to assure themselves that what they're doing is not wrong.
While not exactly what I was expecting, I thought that this book was a lot of fun. I enjoyed the family interactions and I think the whole idea, the thing that this family is really good at, is shattering expectations.