3 Stars

A year after Denali solves the murder of Dan Cumberland, she hears news about the death of the Mendsters. The suspicion falls on Alex Plummer, a new entry into the town. Soon, Denali and her cat, Da Vinci, are on the case. 

The story comes in Denali’s first-person POV. 

This book continues a year after the first. Denali is leading a normal life, though I didn’t find information about her career or income sources. She is young (late 20s), but whether she lived in the town all her life or was away for a while, is something I’m yet to figure out. That’s for the future books, I guess. 

The case in this one is a tad longer. We have new characters, each with a varying amount of importance in the book. Yet again, the mystery is solved easily. Everything is revealed without much effort. A stage-wise resolution might have been helpful. 

Cozy Mystery is my favorite genre, so I like it better when an effort is made to structure the storyline. The plot has potential but needs to be fleshed out. It requires another 3-5k words to read like a decent mystery. 

My copy also has a teaser from book #3. I admit I liked it more than one and two combined. I hope the author takes time to develop it into a longer version. 

Da Vinci continues to shine and is impossible to ignore. He makes the story interesting and adds a few chuckles, too. 

To summarize, Something Like Murder has the potential to become a solid mystery story or even a novelette. However, it’s a one-time read.