TT6: Sanctuary

Welcome to Mysteries to Die For and this Toe Tag.I am TG Wolff and am here with Jack, my piano player and producer. This is normally a podcast where we combine storytelling with original music to put you at the heart of mystery, murder, and mayhem. Today is a bonus episode we call a Toe Tag. It is the first chapter from a fresh release in the mystery, crime, and thriller genre.Today’s featured release is Sanctuary by C.L. Tolbert. Sanctuary was released July 14, 2022 from Level Best Books and is available from Amazon and other book retailers.About C.L. TolbertAn attorney with thirty-five years of experience, Cynthia Tolbert retired and began writing full time. She won the Georgia State Bar Fiction Writing Contest, then developed the winning short story into the first novel of the Thornton Mystery Series, OUT FROM SILENCE, published in 2019. Two additional mysteries in the series have also been published, THE REDEMPTION, in 2021, and SANCTUARY, published in 2022. Cynthia also has a Master’s of Special Education, and taught school for ten years before becoming a lawyer. She lives in Atlanta, GA with her husband and schnauzer, Yoda.Visit Cynthia at www.cltolbert.comFrom September 12 through October 8, 2022 SANCTUARY is on tour with Partners in Crime. Check out the tour link for more content and information: https://www.partnersincrimetours.net/sanctuary-by-c-l-tolbert/ TG Wolff ReviewThis is an amateur sleuth mystery with elements of a legal thriller. James Crosby, as you heard, is dead. The finger of guilt is pointed at a 19-year-old transient who was a member of the church Crosby led. Arrested, the young woman, Stacey Roberts, calls the one person she knows in New Orleans who can help her, law professor Emma Thornton. The quest for Reasonable Doubt takes Emma into the back rooms of a cult, a head shop in the French Quarter, and under the overpass.Bottom line: SANCTUARY is for you if you like sophisticated amateur sleuths, a balanced mixed of whodunnit mystery and legal thriller, and the spicy vibe that is uniquely New Orleans.Let’s compare SANCTUARY to the “perfect amateur sleuth” Strengths of the story. Emma Thornton is a strong protagonist with a well-ordered mind and a good heart. Emma ferrets out facts that characters would rather keep hidden and, in doing so, does drive her story forward. Without Emma, there was a chance that Stacy would have been acquitted (depending on the astuteness of the new lawyer) but the real culprit would not have been captured and there would have been repercussions to other characters of the “bad guy getting away”. The story is 95% about the murder of James Crosby. This is a “win” for readers who just want the mystery and a “loss” for readers who want to get to know their detective. There are 3 minor characters, Emma’s fiancé, Ren, who is a NOLA homicide detective, and her twin boys. Ren becomes more of a character as the story progresses. Every time the boys appeared, they were given a food and sent to their rooms to do homework. I felt bad for them after a few times. For Emma, the “full load” of teaching and supporting students with their cases isn’t part of the story and apparently leaves a lot of time to run around the city. The story is cleanly written with minimal typos.Where the story fell short of ideal: Looking at the story from back to front, the motivation of the killer is solid, but the details are not as strong as the rest of the story. Ms. Tolbert does not give the reader the wrap-up direct from the killer, which contributed to my feeling of not understanding why and how everything was done. I don’t expect this will be an issue for readers unless, like me, you have fun dissecting stories.Of the 34 chapters, all were written from Emma Thorton’s perspective except three. The first, in which we see James’ murder, and two scenes written from Stacy’s perspective. The Stacy scenes interrupted the flow of the storytelling for me without giving me information I wouldn’t have otherwise have gotten in the following chapters.