Reviews

Lynn Morrison and Anne Radcliffe: The Missing Diamond

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Crown Jewels Regency #1

(Editor’s note: this is only available on Kindle Scribe & Audio).

The first in Lynn Morrison and Anne Radcliffe’s Crown Jewels series, The Missing Diamond is a regency delight. Starting at the beginning of the London season, the drama, at first, revolves around who will marry who. At first it seems obvious that the season’s most eligible bachelor, Roland, Lord Percy, will wed the season’s diamond, Lady Charity. Charity is determined to marry as well as she can and her best friend, Lady Grace, is happy to help her do so. read more

Carolyn Haines: Lights, Camera, Bones

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Sara Booth Delaney #27

Lights, Camera, Bones is impressively Carolyn Haines’ 27th book in her Sarah Booth Delaney series. Hollywood comes to take a bite out of Greenville, Mississippi, to film a dramatic movie about a great flood in 1927. It was a very controversial flood for the town as, while there were heroes, there were also some very unfortunate victims left to the mercy of the elements. The Director and lead actor, Marlon Brandon’s, goal is to share the heroic story of how his family saved many during the tragedy. However, not everyone believes that showing off his hero roots is the whole story. There are at least two who are convinced that the movie is there to paint Greenville in a negative light, and dig up old wounds caused by the state’s darker history involving slave labor. What starts as just a few arguments and clashes escalates when Marlon and another member of his crew, Jules, goes missing. read more

Krista Davis: The Diva Goes Overboard

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Domestic Diva #17

Krista Davis’ latest addition to her Domestic Diva Mysteries, The Diva Goes Overboard, follows event planner Sophie Winston in Old Town Alexandria. Her best, and highest maintenance friend, Natasha Smith, has wonderful but shocking news. Her free-spirited mother, Wanda, and local antiques dealer, Orson Chatsworth, are getting married. Sophie is thrilled to be asked to help Natasha get an engagement party together, but not so thrilled with the short time frame she’s given to work with. With the short notice, she already knows finding a venue is going to be more than a little challenging. read more

Michael Bennett: Return to Blood

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Hana Westerman #2

This is an interesting new series.  In the first novel, New Zealand cop Hana Westerman took down a serial killer – and then walks away from the job.  She’s not just a New Zealander, she’s a Māori. The Māori culture is infused into both books, lending them an interest and snap.  She was conflicted in book one: is she a Māori, or is she a cop?  Is she meant to enforce laws against her own people?  In book two she’s back in the tiny seaside town where she grew up, living down the street from her father, Eru. Her daughter, Addison, and her roommate, PLUS 1, are back in Auckland living in Hana’s old place – and to Hana’s annoyance their new puppy is peeing all over her beloved garden. read more

Ann Claire: A Cyclist’s Guide to Crime & Croissants

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Series debut

This is a charming debut, set in the French countryside.  As promised in the title, it provides both cycling and baked goods.  The main character, Sadie Greene, has shucked her secure actuary job in Chicago after the hit and run death of her best friend, Gem, and bought a French bicycle touring company.  She’s all in and her little company, Oui Cycle, is about to take off on it’s first tour. Joining her are – let’s be real – the suspects: her hometown almost family, the Appletons (parents, son, and girlfriend); a sleek German, Manfred; two Scottish sisters who can’t get enough of the baked goods; and a supposedly undercover travel writer, Nigel.  In true Murder, She Wrote style, two of the most unpleasant on the tour, Nigel and Dom Appleton, seem targeted for doom. read more

Daryl Wood Gerber: A Twinkle of Trouble

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Fairy Garden #5

As an enthusiast of mystery and fantasy novels, I am always delighted to find a series that manages to blend the two in an effective and engaging way, and Daryl Wood Gerber’s Fairy Garden Mystery series does just that. Her fifth book, A Twinkle of Trouble, follows our heroine Courtney Kelly during Carmel-by-the-Sea’s Summer Blooms Festival. Her fairy garden shop Open Your Imagination is hosting a booth this year alongside many other local shops and influencers. Other than excitement for the event itself, Courtney is glad for the distraction. Her stalwart companion Fiona has been gone for a bit, having returned to the fairy realm to see her family. Worry for her righteous fairy friend, and what reception she might have received at home, Courtney is determined to focus on the festival as well as some other new side projects. Not to mention her blossoming romance with local restaurant owner, Brady Cash. read more

Susan Elia MacNeal: The Last Hope

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Maggie Hope #11

I’ve been a full on fan of this series from the publication of Mr. Churchill’s Secretary (2012).  MacNeal’s combination of adventure story, history and a vivid and intrepid heroine in the form of Maggie Hope has been irresistible. Maggie, an American who came to Britain during the war and snagged a job in Churchill’s office, finds herself coming full circle: in the first novel she found an assassin, in this last novel, she’s asked to be an assassin.

Many things have happened to Maggie over the course of this long war, and she’s now a full on member of the SOE – Special Operations Executive – Churchill’s squad of espionage agents, of whom more than 3,000 were women.  Their work involved going into occupied Europe and working undercover.  The SOE was formed in 1940, and it was dissolved in ’46, so as this series draws to a close, so does the war and the SOE itself.  It’s a fitting arc for this wonderful character. read more

Ashley Weaver: Locked in Pursuit

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Electra McDonnell #4

I am a huge fan of this series, set in London during the blitz.  Safecracker Electra, working with her uncle Mick, was picked up by British intelligence in the first book for special “help” on a government job, and now four books in, she’s wanting to give up her former life of crime and is completely committed to government service.  Weaver also has the soul of a romance writer, and Electra has two possible and delightful beaus: Felix, whom she’s known since childhood, and the dashing Major Ramsey, her “handler”.  In the last book the two shared a passionate kiss but they now seem to be trying to forget about it.  However, the heart wants what the heart wants. read more

R.L. Graham: Death on the Lusitania

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Patrick Gallagher #1

This book has a ticking clock hanging over it even without any of the machinations of the plot – it’s set aboard the Lusitania on its final voyage.  As each chapter is set to a day, you can watch, as a reader, the time ticking down to May 7, 1915, the day of the disaster.  While there’s a mystery to be solved, the almost larger one is which of the characters encountered in the story will be alive by the end of the book. And this is a very well conceived mystery.

Many, many books are set during WWII, far fewer are set during WWI.  This one takes place at a point when the U.S. has not yet entered the war (the sinking of the Lusitania, of course, will prompt this), but the characters in the novel are still possessed by the war and it hangs over everything.  Shipboard mysteries are traditionally a time away from the happenings of the outside world, but in this book many of the characters are connected to the war in some form or fashion. read more

Catherine Mack: Every Time I Go on Vacation, Some One Dies

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Vacation Mysteries #1

This book takes the form of a very traditional mystery, and turns it on it’s head, standing back a bit to look with fondness at the genre.  There are other writers looking at mysteries in the same way – Elle Cosimano, Anthony Horowitz, Kat Ailes, Benjamin Stevenson and to and extent, Kemper Donovan – but like Cosimano, Ailes and Stevenson, Mack’s take is humorous.  These are not stories written by dumb people.  The stories are smart and the mysteries are clever and tricky, with fairly laid out turns of the plot.  Mack invites the reader to join her somewhat hapless main character in detection, and honestly, as a reader, you might do a better job than Eleanor Dash. read more