Granted

The Family Secrets Series

By: Ellis Summers

Narrated by: Marina Fess, Eden Gabay

Length: 6 hrs

Publisher's summary

Amazing Grant has kept her distance from her mobster family, while entombing her own less-than-savory past. Until now.

With her fugitive grandfather on the lam, the clan's attention focuses on Amazing (Maze) and the ancient journal her great-grandfather secretly passed down to her. Maze's relatives are convinced she's hiding the precious book, and now that they're no longer under the watchful eye of their patriarch, they summon her to Paris for an interrogation.

Facing threats to her fiancé, and an Interpol general using her criminal past to blackmail her, Maze devises a take-down of her entire family. The only thing worse than dragging the people she loves into her battle is discovering the sinister reason the Grant family wants the heirloom journal to remain buried.

From San Francisco to Paris, twists and turns take Maze through grave danger with vengeful criminals. Once the final showdown takes place in Scotland, murder is on everyone's mind.

©2022 Ellis Summers (P)2024 Ellis Summers

Granted

Loved the dual narration of Marina Fess and Eden Gabay

This family saga gets better and better. We find out what happens to the three cousins.
We have great characters, drama , humour, intrigue, mystery, adventure and unexpected twists and turns around every corner. You will be kept on your toes.

I received a free copy of this book via Booksprout and am voluntarily leaving a review.

Peculiar Story

I'm not quite sure what to think of this story. It's hard to pin down a single genre, and even then, of those that could claim it, the story lacks particular elements of each. For instance, it felt like suspense early on but then more of a thriller as the tension and the consequences built, but it didn't have the crucial thriller must-have scene where the protagonist is at the mercy of the villain against seemingly impossible odds. It has multiple romantic aspects, but elements of the supposed romances are decidedly unromantic. All this makes the book feel a bit hazy and unsatisfying. I did enjoy the first half of the book, as we learn some background about what's going on and see the female protagonist endangered nearly every time she turns around, including by some she had trusted previously, while she's grappling with each shock or change and trying to piece together what she should do given her constantly evolving situation.

The book fell apart for me after this first half, once the big European family get-together started, first in France before moving to Scotland. I don't know if it would have helped if I had read or listened to the previous books in the series, but there were so many family members of different generations (and even so many hired help!) with different relationships and allegiances—which were also shifting, aside from being numerous, as the story went along—that I felt like I needed to draw a diagram to keep it all straight. Perhaps it's just me, but I don't like to have to work that hard to understand a book; I listen to audiobooks for pure enjoyment (if fiction) or enlightenment (if nonfiction). Some characterizations, like the rapidly changing Clay, also seemed absolutely bizarre to me. We learn more about him later, but it just came across as odd as his storyline unfolded with a rapid pivot. It also felt like the author was holding back on key information about characters for too long, making the large cast of characters more confusing and inconsistent than they should have been. As you may be able to tell, I wasn't wild about this story.