Jaine Austen is my go-to-gal when I need a cozy mystery pick-me-up.

This installment did not disappoint.

The epilogue has me a little worried, though. Is this the end of her romantic mishaps and sleuthing?

I read an ARC through NetGalley.

Feeling agitated, Hannah steps into her kayak for a short trip to relax. It turns out not to be a relaxing trip, when Hannah finds Moose, the dog of her friend Ezra, and soon after the body of Ezra.

Hannah has a good motive for her sleuthing: she wants to find out more about her friend and why someone wanted him dead.

I liked this story for the most part, except the last 8%. The ending was rushed. As if the author had run out of ideas or time before her deadline.

I read an ARC through NetGalley.

I'm unable to finish this at this time. I think I gave it a good enough shot, made it to page 179.

The narrative is very in your face and there is little room for nuance, or descriptive details. The story seems to be driven by dialogue, because outside dialogue not much of interest is mentioned.

The dialogue isn’t very interesting either. Why do people even talk to Marla? Just because she’s asking questions? She doesn’t seem to strike up rapport with any of the people she speaks with, yet they continue talking to her.

Flipped ahead to find out who the murderer was.

Spoiler

By page 179 Marla hadn't even spoken to this person yet. There are a couple of mentions only.

That may be realistic in this situation, but in a murder mystery, all characters of interest should have met with the sleuth in the first third of the story.

It’s not good when it turns out the best thing I can say about a book is that it fell open so well that I didn’t need to break the spine of the book to be able to read the lines entirely.

The body is found at the end of the first chapter. Which is really fast, especially for a first in series where usually the first three to five chapters are used for establishing the character in her environment. Getting to the mystery quickly, I’m for that. Good.

Next, not so good. In chapter two comes the sheriff, who I almost instantly dislike. He has not looked at the dead body for five seconds (because Winnie had locked herself in the room with it) before he starts questioning Winnie and her Granny, but he already knows that Granny and her neighbour had an ongoing feud and that the last call to the victim’s phone was from Granny. How did he already have access to the victim’s phone? It’s only been five minutes since Winnie opened the door to the police.

The sheriff’s described as good looking, so sadly, he is going to be the love interest.

The timing of events in this book is mostly wrong. The Sheriff knows things he cannot possibly know yet from his short time on the scene. Winnie cleans up and props out the barn she wants to use for her cider shop AFTER the loans officer of the bank has come for a visit; would make more sense to do that before. Also, it would make sense if Winnie found out how much it would cost to renovate the barn for her shop BEFORE she applies for a loan to cover those costs; Winnie seems to have gotten that one backwards as well. Winnie receives a (warning) note under her windshield after she has taken one foray into investigating the murder; surely the murderer is not already spooked by her.

Winnie is spooked by the note, though. Which is odd as this is her first murder investigation and the note is an instruction and not a threat. Surprised would be more fitting, perhaps mixed with a little unsettlement. Fear should not come in until after

Spoiler

Winnie is ran off the road.

And specially featuring wrong timing: Winnie comments that thanks to daylight saving time it’s already dark. The story is, however, set after Thanksgiving, which is on the fourth Thursday of November. Daylight saving time in West-Virginia ends on the first Sunday of November.

The murder mystery came to a halt somewhere in the middle, but that may also be due to the fact that I kept putting the book down. At least, I think Winnie stopped her investigation and continued doing other things. She kept receiving threats. Apparently, the killer thought she had continued with her investigation.

Spoiler

The number of times the killer came after Winnie with new threats is ridiculous. It went well beyond a warning to stop investigating and became more of a personal vendetta.

The sheriff doesn’t discuss this option with Winnie, so I guess he never figured that part out - despite his great track record as an investigator.

I was enjoying this book for the most part. It’s not a cozy - despite the cozy cover - it’s much darker. But it’s also well written and an interesting story to follow.

But I almost DNF when the police chief said “I’ll talk to him about laying a trap for [the killer].”

No! Why can’t you just make an arrest rather than risk endangering other people?

The unfold then featured my most hated cozy trope (it’s a trope if authors keep throwing it into stories).

Death and Fondue is a lighthearted cozy mystery. It heavily features Abby Hirsch’ adventures in catering and the food buying and food prep involved.

There’s a mystery too, somewhere in the background.

A group of five colleagues, who don’t seem to like each other very much, come to stay at Primrose House, the B&B of Abby’s aunt Meg. One of them makes a nasty fall and the others start to accuse each other of pushing him.

Abby, with some experience in sleuthing and more experience in speculating, enlists friends and family with nosing around. After all, she’s got her catering jobs and her aunt’s birthday and marketing of her catering company to think about.

The story is so lighthearted that I didn’t even feel any tension built up when Abby’s car broke down on the way to a catering gig. That sort of thing would have sent my stress levels up to high, but Abby just made a simple deduction who she could call on for a ride. (Or I may have just thought: “Oh, so that’s why Abby didn’t ask Bertie if she could borrow her SUV, after Bertie indicated she wasn’t going to use it for the day.”)

I read an ARC through Booksirens

Hayley Snow receives an email about a forty-five-year-old missing person’s case. She is intrigued. After discussing it with her friends, Hayley decides to meet up with the woman and find out what her story is.

The woman, Catherine, spins an interesting yarn and without much of a struggle, Hayley is roped into driving her to a few places where Catherine and her friend hung out. At one of these places, Catherine, and Hayley, stumble across the body of one of the people she used to know back in the day.

Coincidence?

Hayley - and the police - entertain the possibility it is not. Hayley contemplates whether it is possible Catherine went to the motel in the morning, killed, then returned to her hotel to be picked up by Hayley at ten, in order to have Hayley with her when she ‘found’ the body. But if Catherine had plotted this, then why did she go into the office alone and discover the body on her own. If Hayley was supposed to be her alibi, why not make sure Hayley was her alibi all the way?

Hayley decides to speak to a few people from Catherine’s past without her. To see if they tell a different story, or talk more freely. Surprisingly, they do. Very few are deterred by the bombardment of questions Hayley unleashes on them.

It irked me that Hayley was not very good at asking questions. She asks too many questions without waiting for answers and she doesn’t ask good follow up questions. When Arthur says: “But when I think back on that last night before she disappeared, I think that can’t be true.” Hayley does not jump on the opportunity to ask: So what happened that night. Rather she asks a completely unrelated question. (Later Miss Gloria mentions that “Nobody’s exactly told us what occurred that last night.” Of course not! If you don’t ask. They don’t even have to be evasive about it.)

Then Catherine herself disappears, but this does not seem to get more than an eyebrow raise.

Hayley continues her investigation, she has become intrigues by the old missing person’s case.

I read an ARC through NetGalley.

This story was mostly about food prep and very little about a murder mystery.

Knot Dead Again is the first in the Yarn Retreat series for me. The first few chapters, where all the series regulars seem to be introduced, were a bit overwhelming because of that. At the same time I had the feeling I was missing out on something. This had mainly to do with the relationship between Casey and Dane.

But as soon as Casey, and the story, arrived at Vista Del Mar, the feeling of being left out subsided. From here the book can be read as a stand alone. There is a very slow run up to the (first) death, which Casey spends for a large amount sitting in the lobby watching all the key players/guests arrive.

The story continues to be slow moving after one of the guest, the host of another retreat scheduled the same weekend, is found dead in his bed. It seems he died of natural causes in his sleep, though Casey treats the room as a crime scene. Even calls it a crime scene and calls the police to report the death rather than a physician. Not that either can reach the hotel due to the storm and fallen trees.

The other guests are all unpleasant people. When Casey and Cloris, the interim hotel manager, finally decide to tell the other guests a guest has passed away - they didn’t tell before because they didn’t want them to get upset - the guests respond with “a barrage of questions about the cause”. There are pleasant and unpleasant ways to inform about a cause of death. This sounded like an unpleasant way. There was no mention that any one of them expressed condolences to the widow, who was sitting only a few feet away from the rest of the group.

It seems the widow was not consulted about when and what information to share with the group. No points for Casey and Cloris on empathy either.

Or on smarts for that matter. Having decided that the death was suspicious after all, Casey comes up with one suspect: the wife. She would have the best opportunity to use the means. Casey conveniently ignores that the wife also has the best opportunity to remove the means from the room of the victim before warning anyone about her husband’s death. Unless she forgot, she would have no reason to go back and remove the means at a later time.

Aside from my dislike of citing “the wife is the first suspect”, considering only one suspect makes for a rather boring murder mystery. Actually, almost 70% into the book, it becomes rather aggravating that Casey and friends are still looking at only one suspect. The victim was going to host a retreat; his wife was not the only person present that knew he was was going to be there. At least two other people knew too, and there were at least two people present that disliked him. How hard is it to keep an open mind (Casey’s words) that is actually open to alternative scenarios?

Props for the author for showing what tunnel vision looks like. It’s not until 87% into the story that Casey considers that someone wanted to frame the wife for the murder of her husband.

The plot of the book sounded like it could have a great mystery: a group of people is cut off from the outside world, then one of them dies. It could have been a real tension grabber. In stead it got bogged down in meal prep and thinking of activities to keep a group of adults busy. And no one thought of the activity ‘see if we can get the road cleared ourselves so we can get out of here’. Bunch of wet blankets.

I read an ARC through NetGalley.

Recently divorces Christina Emory stands to inherit the estate of her late aunt, if she is willing (and able) to meet the conditions of the will. Since she has to uproot her life because of the divorce anyway, Christina decides to accept.

Christina narrates the story. She has a mildly mocking tone.

I spent the first chapter wondering why she had ever even married her ex. The ex is mentioned a lot and every sentence re-enforces the notion that they were an ill-matched pair.

The story is short, only 145 pages (the other twenty pages are recipes). And the murder doesn’t happen until page 67. Which leaves barely 80 pages to solve the crime.

The story has great scene setting, but the plotting of the mystery needs work. There is potential though.

Plus, this story got me interested in picking up quilting.