Wicked Ways by Lisa Jackson and Nancy Bush

Title: Wicked Ways
Author: Lisa Jackson and Nancy Bush
Series: The Colony #4
Genre: Romantic Suspense
Publisher: Kensington Pub Corp  (October 7, 2014)
Source: NetGalley eArc
Rating: ☕☕

Elizabeth Gaines Ellis is an ordinary suburban wife and mother. That's what she tells herself as she flits between her realtor job, yoga class, and caring for her daughter, Chloe. But for months now, Elizabeth has worried that she's far from normal…that she's somehow the cause of a series of brutal, horrible deaths.
Her mean-spirited boss. A bullying traffic cop. Her cheating husband. Elizabeth had reason to be angry with them all. She didn't mean for them to die. No one will take her fears seriously—except the private investigator prying into her past.…
The more scared and angry Elizabeth becomes, the higher the death toll grows. But those who wrong her aren't the only ones in danger. Because others have secrets too, and a relentless urge to kill without mercy or remorse.

My Thoughts: This is my first book by both Lisa Jackson and Nancy Bush and I am wondering whose writing style this book falls under. To me it was long and tedious. So many pages with nothing happening!

Let's start with the biggest issue in the book. Elizabeth. We spent so much time in her head I really wanted to gouge my eyes out with a dull pencil. #1)This woman apparently spends a lot of time wishing bad things to happen to a lot of people. Not just bad things but death. What kind of person wishes evil things onto people? Not a good one in my eyes. Which leads us to #2) She thinks she has a psychic ability to actually make people die if she wishes it so we spend a lot of time reading about how guilty she feels because she made it happen. What kind of person truly believes they can wish someone to death? Oh wait...she believes it because #3)When she was a child she could see bad things happen before they actually did. Oh wait...she really didn't remember that for the most part so I guess she's just a nutball. #4) After a week trying to get used to her husband being dead she falls in lust with someone else. #5) Her well meaning friends worked hard to engage Elizabeth to get out of the house and have some fun. Once Elizabeth accepted the invites we then had to read her internal musing on how much she hated it and couldn't wait to ditch her friends. Yes I hated Elizabeth.

Let's talk plot: Well, the secondary storyline with Elizabeth's cousin Ravinia going on a journey to find Elizabeth was actually better than the one with Elizabeth, herself. The hunt for Elizabeth (who had been adopted as a baby) was faster paced than the primary mystery. Not a whole lot faster but some. However, the addition of a romantic interest for Elizabeth 2/3 into the book was a mistake as there wasn't enough time to see a relationship form let alone something as complex as love. Especially since Rex and Elizabeth do not spend more than a few minutes together over the course of several days. The ending seemed rushed as it finally wrapped up the plot thread introduced in the prologue in what felt like an afterthought. Seriously, the beginning is not mentioned in any way for over 400 pages other then we readers could speculate if Elizabeth was that stolen baby or not. Who the stolen baby was seemed a total stretch even factoring in the paranormal psychic stuff into the equation.

In a Nutshell: I didn't like this book at all. I'm character driven and I just didn't like many of the enormous cast of characters in this book. To tell the truth the only character I was intrigued by was more of a ghost of a character as they are mentioned within the book but no one is really sure if they were actually there or not. When coming up with my 2 star/cup of coffee rating I factored in whether or not this book could be read as a standalone or not. This is the only book I have read to date in this series. I do not think that I would have enjoyed this book more if I'd read the first three. To tell the truth if the first 3 are similar to this one I probably would have quit the series after book 2 and never got to book 4 to begin with. I think there probably is some background on the Colony and the women who live there that may be of interest to readers, in addition to some plot details of earlier books that had been mentioned in this one briefly but I'm really not interested in going back and reading the first three. Except I also have the 3rd book (Something Wicked) from NetGalley which I feel obligated to read and review, which I will do....someday.