Monthly Archives: June 2014

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Cloche and Dagger by Jenn McKinlay

 

This book is one of the group reads for the Cozy Mystery Corner on Goodreads this month.  I had just finished book one in another series by this author, Sprinkle with Murder, and I enjoyed that so I was looking forward to trying this one.

This was a great cozy  mystery!  I liked it more than the other series by this author, although that might also be the setting.  In Cloche and Dagger, the protagonist Scarlett returns home to London from Florida after a particularly embarrassing breakup that was recorded for posterity on the internet.   The London setting was a change of pace from other cozies that I have been reading lately.

The pacing was excellent, I finished the book in one sitting.   The characters of Harrison, Andre and Nick added humor and romance to the story line.  The mystery was interesting and the twist revealed at the funeral was well done.  Two mysteries are really involved here,  the disappearance of Viv and a murder of one of the hat shop’s customers.  They are both solved satisfactorily at the end.

I don’t wear hats or know anything about them really, however no prior knowledge or interest is necessary to enjoy this story.  The  hat theme is present but not overwhelming.  The only criticism I would have is that the disappearance of Viv was somewhat far fetched, required a  little suspension of disbelief.

Fun, quick read and I will be looking to read the next in the series.

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Death of a Hollow Man by Caroline Graham

  I have been on  a Midsomer Murders binge lately.  Being laid up off and on with my ankle injury, I have watched the whole series on Acorn TV and loved it.  I finally decided to start reading the books.  This is the second in the book series.

An all round good mystery read, Death of a Hollow Man, was adapted very closely in the TV series.  The characters of Barnaby, Joyce, Cully and Troy were all here.  Cully didn’t have much space devoted to her but the reader still develops a sense of who she is as a person from her father’s thoughts.  I also developed more insight into Joyce’s character than I had from the TV show.  Barnaby himself is a great protagonist and detective.

The other characters, suspects and villains, are laid out with twists and turns of the plot including red herrings.  The sense of place is well developed, which is important in a village mystery. The reader gets a good feel for the social dynamics and character ofthe village.

Highly recommended read, I just wish I would have read them first before watching the series, but they are enjoyable nonetheless.

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Brownies & Broomsticks by Bailey Cates

 

Just finished this one, I will start by saying I don’t read too many paranormal/magical cozies.  I prefer the plots to be heavier on the mystery and lighter on the magic/paranormal elements when I do read them.  I loved the Savannah setting.  I visited Savannah last summer and it is a lovely city, so I really did enjoy reading a book set in Savannah.

Mungo the Magnificent as a sidekick was cute and entertaining without being obnoxious.  The protagonist, Katie, is not aware of her powers or history at the beginning of the book.  She moves to Savannah to help her Aunt and Uncle start a bakery business.   Through her Aunt she learns more about her history and her powers.  There is an entire coven of witches waiting to bring Katie into the fold.

At an initial party hosted in the bakery, one of the city’s leading ladies is murdered.  Katie’s uncle is the suspect, so Katie takes it upon herself to attempt to clear his name.  Her investigation involves varied side kicks and sometimes magic.  There are also two competing romantic interests thrown in to the mix.

The red herrings are plentiful, but the resolution was lacking.  Information to solve the crime wasn’t revealed until the reveal. Overall, a cute, quick cozy, that will be good for readers who like paranormal/magical cozies.

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The Strangling on the Stage by Simon Brett

 

Read this book by mistake, I picked it up from the library thinking it was the next book, however it turns out I missed two books from the series.

I have been reading the Feathering series by Simon Brett for quite a while and I really enjoy them.  I love the characters of Jude and Carole and their atypical crime solving partnership.  This outing in the series involves an amateur dramatics group that Jude and then Carole become involved in.  One of the actors is strangled with a noose and the investigation takes off!

I always like Simon Brett’s humor at the expense of comfortable middle class life with petty vanities and rivalries galore.  I am going to have to go back and read the two books I missed before I say anything more because Carole and Jude’s friendship/partnership seems somehow different in this, number 15 in the series.  Perhaps it is something that I missed in the previous books.   I didn’t feel that Carole had a strong a role, especially initially in the book and that Jude’s “healing” practices took over at times.

Really great series overall and I will go back and read what I missed.

 

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Sprinkle with Murder by Jenn McKinlay

 

Fun first in a series.  Well written with a fun trio of main characters, Melanie, Angie and Tate.  Melanie and Angie are co-owners of  the Fairy Tale Cupcake Bakery.  Tate’s fiance is murdered and that puts both Tate and Melanie directly in the path of the investigation.  Melanie start investigating to save herself and Tate.  There are several probable suspects and Melanie does conduct her own investigation into the murder.

I did figure out the mystery far before the end, so perhaps a one of the clues was a little too obvious, but I still enjoyed reading it to the end.  The only other issue I had was the relationship between Angie’s brother Joe and Melanie.  It seemed to me unrealistic that Melanie was Angie’s best friend and yet had not had contact or interaction with Joe since she was in middle school and so had never gotten over her crush.   This romance was a pretty light element in the book though so this is not that big of a problem.

I will read more in this series and see where it goes.

 

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Tressed to Kill by Lila Dare

 

Very cute first in a new series.  The southern setting is charming and the author doesn’t overdo it by interjecting too many cutesy southernisms.  The premise is that the protagonist, Grace,  has returned home from a life and marriage in Atlanta to the small town she grew up in and where her mother,Violetta, still lives.  She now works in her mother’s salon and is attempting to start over.

One of the town’s leading ladies is murdered after a public argument with Violetta, which makes Violetta the prime suspect.  There is the prerequisite hunky cop, Dillon, or Marshall as Grace refers to him in their bantering.  Hank, Grace’s ex, is also in town and they often run into each other adding to the drama.

The red herrings were well done and I didn’t solve the main mystery ahead of time which is always fun.  A well done mystery plot tying together multiple, mysteries past and present.

Some of the descriptions could have been a little less wordy but that was a very minor issue.  All in all, a fun quick cozy mystery read and good start to a new series.

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Sink Trap by Christy Evans

 

Sink Trap has been on my TBR list for a while and it was actually available from my local library so I picked it up this week.

There is a lot to like in this first of a plumbing themed cozy mystery series.  The main character, Georgiana Neverall, her mother, Sandra, her “not my boyfriend”, Wade, and boss, Barry are all good characters.  They are interesting and behave as they are drawn. The relationships between them flow naturally in conversation and are believable, (who doesn’t have moments that their mother drives them nuts?)  The plumbing theme is not overwhelming but the pieces included are interesting, at least to me.  The book is well written as far as voice and tone for a cozy mystery.

The issue is that it is patently obvious almost from the beginning of the mystery, when Georgiana finds the brooch of Ms. Tepper in the sink trap, who the villains are and basically why they did it.  The rest of the book is spent with the sleuth leading the readers around as she chases red herrings and tires to convince others that a crime has actually been committed.  She lets her feelings of animosity towards certain characters drive her investigation rather than looking at what is actually happening. In fact, she doesn’t really solve the mystery, the reveal is more that the killer(s) come out.

There is enough enjoyable here with the characters and the setting that I will probably give another in the series a try.

 

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Good Enough to Eat by Stacey Ballis

 

Picked up this one from the library and really enjoyed it.  If I had to classify it, I would call it more women’s fiction, however there is some romance in it.  Melanie, the protagonist, has lost a lot of weight, basically a whole other person.  On top of that she has changed careers, giving up the law for a healthy eating food business and just as she is feeling the success of these positive changes her husband leaves her.  The fact that he left her for a heavier woman and a woman who was her friend just added salt to the wound.

This could have been a very typical “fat girl gets thin, finds love, lives happily ever after”, however it is not.  The author does a great job showing that the weight is not the defining feature of Melanie, there is so much more to her, and any person than his or her body size.  The supporting characters, Kai, Phil, Nadia and Nate all have interesting lives and are well fleshed out.  The intersection of this particular group of people is believable and works with the plot of the story.

The treatment of food addiction/comfort eating/unhealthy relationship with food is well done.  Food is a really difficult addiction to live with and conquer, mainly because you can’t just go cold turkey on it 🙂 and it is not a very sympathy inducing addiction.  This struggle is really brought to life well through Melanie, her actions and reactions and her relationship and conversations with her nutritionist, Carey.  As someone who struggles with my own weight, I could so relate to Melanie’s feelings and experiences and they rang very true to me.

I loved the ending…I won’t give it away but definitely not typical.  Highly recommended read!

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Divorce Can Be Murder by Victoria Pade

 I picked up this one at my local second hand book seller.  I hadn’t heard anything about it but the cover and title intrigued me.

Jimi Plain is a technical writer and a single mother of 2 girls.  She has an ex, who is the girls’ father.  He is active “off screen” through broken promises and phone calls interwoven in the story.  Danny is her policeman cousin and Nell is her Grandmother.  At the beginning of the book, Jimi is moving her girls into the house with Danny and Nell somewhat regretfully but financially necessary.  Other characters include Linda, a good friend and neighbor in the middle of a divorce, and Audrey, a nun and counselor, who runs a divorce recovery group.  Although Audrey is a main character, and Nell and Danny both are regular church goers,  the story line is not preachy or full of religious references or moral “lessons”.

The Divorce group is at the center of the murders and the plot twists and turns.  The character of Jimi was interesting and sympathetic.  The other members of the divorce group seemed to me to represent the gamut of reactions to divorce and were very well done.  Jimi’s girls also gave realistic faces to teen children of divorce.  The representations of divorce and the impacts not only on the couple divorcing but others around them were particularly well done.

There were many intersections in the relationships among the characters and this led to red herrings in the mystery plot line. I did figure out the culprit at chapter 25 out of 35, however there was one piece I was wrong about and I did doubt myself a little bit so the book was still very engaging and the twist right at the end was unexpected.

A warning, simply because many cozy readers don’t like cursing at all, there are about two instances of cursing in the book but no sex.  That is a non-issue for me, but I do know that some readers expect their cozies to be clean.

I enjoyed this book and would read another in the series.  I am glad to have stumbled across it.