Drown Her Sorrows (Bree Taggert Book 3)

Melinda Leigh

Montlake Pub

March 16^th, 2021

Drown Her Sorrows by Melinda Leigh blends a murder mystery, a police procedural, and gripping characters with a tinge of romance. Readers will take a journey with her empathetic main characters.

The story opens with Sheriff Bree Taggert finding an abandoned car with a suicide note in a purse.  After searching by the river, she finds the body of a woman floating near the bank.  The body is identified as 34-year-old Holly Thorpe, a bookkeeper at a local construction company and someone involved in a volatile marriage.  An autopsy reveals she was dead before she hit the water. The suspects pile up between Holly’s husband, her abusive employer, and her estranged sister.  Bree asks Matt Flynn, a former dog handler, who is now a consultant, to help her untangle all the lies, treachery, and red herrings.

Reading a Leigh book allows the reader to find a gripping story.  This case is no different, where the author explores emotional abuse not only by Holly’s employer, but also by Matt’s former brother-in-law, Greg. She shows how bullies see themselves as bigger, stronger, and enjoy making others cower through intimidation. 

“What I put in about restraining orders is true.  Unless someone is there all the time to enforce them, it doesn’t always work. Plenty of women are killed by those who had a restraining order.  They are only as good as the authority who enforces them and if the order is respected.  The character Greg was the type of person who would obey it to the letter but would cross the red line.”

“I incorporated in the story how police interviews must be specialists.  They need to read people and project the right emotion.  They must hide who they really are and project what they need in order to get the information needed.  They have no problem in making up lies. Whether interviewing a bully or a victim they need to understand the dynamics.”

This third book in the series also goes into more detail about Bree’s relationships and her personal life. She is caring for her niece and nephew, reconnecting with her brother Adam, mourning her sister Erin, and starting an intimate relationship with former deputy Matt. Readers are able to see how she must navigate between her duties as a Sheriff and her personal life. In some ways, Bree is smart and strong, but she also has a vulnerability from her emotional and physical scars.

“I wanted to show how all working mothers must juggle motherhood and professional responsibility.  For Bree it is a new thing.  She is thrown in there and must navigate trial by fire.  She is also trying to deal with her own hardships. She wants to move forward even if she knows there will be times of sadness.  She still has to learn to live and give herself permission to have happy moments while grieving. Bree’s way of owning what happened to her and accepting it was to have that tattoo on her shoulder.  I describe it in the book, ‘delicate dark green vines with a dragonfly in flight perched on her shoulder blade. Its wings are fully spread and has a body of brilliant blue and pale green.  I choose a dragonfly because it symbolizes change and metamorphosis.”

As with all her books, dog lovers get some scenes with these four-legged characters.  Brody, Matt’s former partner, who retired with him, a German Shepherd actually saves the day in this story. There is also Greta, a young black German Shepherd being trained by Matt, and Ladybug, a dog who is showing Bree and her family unconditional love.

“I love to write about dogs because I love them.  Currently, I have two rescues, but it is always a revolving door.  I have the real Ladybug and a little Spaniel rescue who are buddies.”

Anyone who has not read Leigh before is missing a good storyline. This book is full of suspense, twists, and will keep the readers guessing until the very end. Readers will have to wait until September to get the next installment titled Right Behind Her where Bree and her brother Adam go back to the abandoned family farm.  Adam is trying to seek knowledge, while Bree is trying to suppress it.

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