Faithful Unto Death [Paperback]

FAITHFUL UNTO DEATH is Stephanie Jaye Evans's first novel, and is the inaugural story in her "Sugar Land Mystery" series. The book is set in Sugar Land, a small Texan town that's home for a mix of regular Southern folk, as well as affluent sports celebrities, doctors, and lawyers. The hero of the story is a Church of Christ pastor named Walker Wells, though his friends and family call him "Bear." He lives as quiet a life as the pastor of a 1,000-member church can, aided and challenged by his wife, Annie Laurie, and his 14-year-old daughter Jo (he has an older daughter, Merrie, but she's in college).

In this first mystery, a young girl comes across a dead man while walking past the town's golf course on her way to school. His head had been beaten in with a golf club. Bear was acquainted with the dead man, but not so much that he wants get involved in the investigation. But the man's wife was active in Bear's church, and it seems Bear might have been the last person the man spoke to. As the story progresses, Bear's own curiosity, and the fact that the investigation keeps intersecting with his life, draws him in deeper, and gets him into more trouble than he bargained for.

Overall, I enjoyed this book. It's written as a first-person narrative from Bear's perspective, and the voice is believable. If you live in the South, as I do, you'll find a familiarity to the tone, the atmosphere, the cadence of speech, and the lifestyle. Stephanie has captured it all well, I think.

A good portion of the story seems to focus on Bear's interactions with his family, and painting a portrait of the town and its people. Given that this is the first in a series set in this same town, I think that kind of world-building is inevitable and necessary. But it's not all irrelevant, as it helps to give context and familiarize us with the characters-and potential suspects. An important undercurrent to the story is Bear's strained relationship with his 14-year-old daughter. I cringed a few times at the way he spoke to her and tried to deal with her rebellion, but I have five daughters, two of whom are teens, and one is a pre-teen, so I understand how hard it can be to say the right thing (and how easy it is to get it wrong!).

One other interesting aspect of the story I want to comment on is the character of the detective and his relationship to Bear. Detective Wanderley really doesn't need Bear's help in the investigation, and, in fact, more than once says that Bear should get his nose out and let Wanderley do his job. Wanderley comes across as arrogant and self-important, but he is also good at what he does. On occasion Bear discovers something only to find that Wanderley had already figured it out. Sparks fly naturally between the two men-Wanderley taking Bear's interest as a slight against his abilities, and Bear feeling as though Wanderley is too full of himself to allow for outside assistance. Through the course of the story, though, you see the two men attempt to find respect for one another, and I suspect this is a relationship that will build as the series progresses.

The pace of the story is comfortable, with some good twists, and interesting characters. I would rate the language PG13, with a handful of s-words, and a few g-ds. If you like mysteries, this is one that'll keep you guessing. The murderer isn't obvious, and there are plenty of suspects to choose from.

I thoroughly enjoyed the tongue-in cheek humor in this murder mystery starring, as the unlikely hero, Bear Wells, former football player turned clergyman. He is not above thinking sarcastic, snarky comments he doesn't dare voice or losing his temper, and he cares a little too much about maintaining his pastoral image. The story is told through his first-person perspective; and as we encounter the various characters, we see them through his eyes, with all their foibles and failings. The clash of egos between blustering HD, self-righteous Dr. Fallon, and hysterical Honey in the ER exam room was so vividly portrayed I thought I was there. The author truly paints pictures with words.

It is not your usual "Christian" book; heartfelt expressions of faith are surrounded by profanity-not a lot but it's there-and nitty-gritty matters of everyday life. You don't find bland characters and syrupy dialogue; the characters are quirky and the dialogue witty. Bear is authentically true to his Christian calling and does his best to act with integrity even while being insulted on all sides. As the detective will say, Bear really believes that "turn the other cheek stuff". He deals with his troubled daughter as ineptly as any other flesh and blood father, yet his faith rings true as he tries to help her and the members of the community--whether they appreciate it or not. He listens with compassion to every character except for his wife and daughter. It is as if he just can't see who and what his daughter is, no matter how his wife tries to explain her needs to him. There is a great confrontation scene at the funeral, but he continues to be clueless.

Once the reader has been hooked by the presentation of the characters, the book evolves into just plain good story telling. Driven by the dead man's words that "it was on him now", Bear tries to solve the murder to help the innocent. The ending was a complete surprise to me but very satisfying. This was just a good, absorbing, heart-touching story with a little murder mystery thrown in.

I won this book in a Goodreads giveaway, but the thoughts are mine.

Bear Wells, a former University of Texas football player-turned-Church-of-Christ-minister is the unlikely sleuth in this warm and witty cozy that grabbed me and wouldn't let me go until the unlikely killer was nabbed. There's no gratuitous profanity in "Faithful Unto Death," but there is a smattering of expletives to keep the characters right in tune with reality.

Thankfully, Big Bear Wells' piety is never self-righteous. I loved the way the author infused the burly pastor with the heart and soul of a good man--and the feelings and frustrations of a real man. Not in the mood for a sermon? I wasn't either. And I didn't find one in "Faithful Unto Death." In fact, it is Pastor Wells who does most of the learning. First, the endearing protagonist learns from Jo, his independent teenaged daughter who smacks dad in the gut with the news she is in love with the chief murder suspect. Bear's loving marriage to spirited-wife Annie Laurie, teaches the good pastor to reexamine some old ways.

My favorite part? The way the book looks at love on many levels--from illicit to committed and conjugal. By the way, father-daughter devotion is also present in spades. I loved seeing how Bear's relationship with the cocky Detective Wanderley develops--two men who are poles apart, but are determined to tolerate, and even respect each other. I look forward to reading more about these two guys in future Sugar Land mysteries. This was a fun book that kept me alert with surprise.