An Avalanche Needed to Bury This Book (Jack Frost review)

Some things make no sense.

Take me, and cold weather. There isn’t much extra “fluff” on my frame, which means I’ll probably shiver if the smallest breeze picks up. My extremities have less-than-robust circulation, so my fingertips and toes have this annoying little habit of going numb and turning a creepy shade of death whenever it’s chilly outside. And don’t get me started on the thought of jumping into any (unheated) body of water unless the day is over 90 degrees F.

By all rights, then, I should have an aversion to all that is snowy or cold… yet that isn’t the case, at all. Maybe I just revel in being perverse (entirely possible), or proving how tough I am (also believable), but I actually really like that stuff, including reading about and watching it. 

So, when Christopher Greyson’s Jack Frost came across my radar, I thought, “A P.I. takes a case on the down-low for a client who produces a popular survivalist reality TV show, and the current season, set high up a treacherous mountain in the middle of blizzard season, is being plagued by freaky accidents and threats? Ok!”… (despite it being part of an ongoing series I’ve never read). 

The verdict on this one, though? Oy.

First, the good (or not-so-bad). Jack Frost is certainly an easy read. The main characters—Jack and his business partner/fiancee—are likable enough (although ridiculously young, in their mid- and early-20s, respectively), and Greyson does a decent job fleshing out most of the other players, as well. Of course, the real stars here are the mountain and the weather, and again, the author depicts them with enough skill to give you a good sense of how fraught the situations are.

But, that’s where the praise ends. Greyson’s writing style is overly-simplistic; this book could easily be shelved in the Young Adult section. (Not that I haven’t read—and enjoyed—some YA books; it’s just that a little more finesse with words and structure would’ve been greatly appreciated.) Jack Frost is also glaringly… innocent, if you will. (Even the most-buttoned-up librarian could feel safe loaning this out to a pre-teen, because not only is there no sex, there’s nothing remotely salacious, and very little saucy language.) I wasn’t prepared for such a thoroughly-sanitized book.

As for the plot, itself? Meh. (At least Greyson doesn’t telegraph the baddie to his readers early on; it took me awhile to work out for sure who was behind all the bad things goin’ on.) My biggest objection—for a couple of reasons—is actually a side plot involving Jack’s fiancee’s past (her parents’ deaths when she was a child, as yet unresolved, in her mind). It’s apparent that this issue has been a factor in previous books, but as a newcomer to the series, it feels like a needless distraction. Worse, though, is the cartoonish (again, ridiculously-young-and-super-hot-but-also-super-lethal) and entirely unbelievable Asian female character that this subplot requires. (In a word? Ugh.) 

So, if something that technically isn’t (but nonetheless smacks of) YA—tailored for, oh, 11-year-old girls and maybe 13-year-old boys—is up your alley, Jack Frost might just be your cuppa. This series will get a strong pass from me, in future, though. 

~GlamKitty

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