this is a fun book. 

it really has a similar tone to the tv show and the characters are recognizable from the show so props to the author for actually managing to write … well basically well done fanfiction that was officially published. 
(by the way that’s not a negative at all, love fanfiction and read way to many of them for decades now and would never say anything negative about them!)


honestly the only negative i have about this is that natalie is not a great person. 
she tries to appear as if she’s this helpful and nice person but she is incredibly unthankful and quite often disrespectful. 
while she recognizes there Monk is special and his behavior is as well, and she loves being part of solving the crime, everything else about her job is treated as if she didn’t know what she would get herself into or has to “deal” with as part of her job and as if it’s a huge inconvenience for her. 
she mentions quite often how Monks behavior is too much or inconvenient or disruptive or disrespectful but she puts herself in situations where those things can appear that why simply because Monk is who he is and he can’t change that. 
if you let someone with OCD stay in your house -i am sorry but what do you expect? them not to clean and rearrange? it’s a compulsion! if they couldn’t do it and stop they would! 
you can’t complain about it and how it’s not what you want but let’s face it if you decide to let someone like Monk stay with you it comes with positives and negatives (you will never have a cleaner place then after he was there but everything will be rearranged to his specifications).
also she complains about having to clean her house (understandable) but then also complains when someone else like monk does it for her? (what? why that’s the cleanest her place ever been!)

Natalie’s entire job is knowing Monk so why is she surprised or reacts as if she couldn’t have seen it happen and actually complains that Monk cleans up a half eaten grill cheese from under her couch (which yuck! i am so with Monk on that that if she has stuff like that in her living spaces she needed a desperate deep clean!). 

and while i have no clue what Monk is paying her she certainly has enough money to not only keep her house and car without problem but also put her kid in all kinds of after school activities but also very often pay a babysitter -so really how badly paid can she be? 
she waited tables and bartended before i don’t think she made more there! 
and really her job is secure - a guy like Monk won’t fire her if not for extreme circumstances because he would never want that change in his life! the jobs she listed has having done before she could never know if she had them next month!
again what is she complaining about? 

and look i am not saying that a guy like monk wouldn’t drive everyone up a wall sometimes but complaining about the typical behavior seems a bit much. 

Natalie has some small good moments but between how she describes and reacts to Monk as well as some other people throughout this book she comes over as a completely spoiled and ungrateful brat. 

and while i wish the author took some liberties with natalie as a character - if i remember the show right he nailed her character and behavior perfectly! 


the rest of the book was great though. 
the mysteries where well done and i loved how it all come together and how it was solved! 

the writing was great the length of the book perfect and the entire thing felt like an episode! 

very well done!