{"id":4144,"date":"2021-08-07T07:27:09","date_gmt":"2021-08-07T14:27:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/?p=4144"},"modified":"2021-08-07T07:27:09","modified_gmt":"2021-08-07T14:27:09","slug":"hannah-dennison-danger-at-the-cove","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/hannah-dennison-danger-at-the-cove\/","title":{"rendered":"Hannah Dennison: Danger at the Cove"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>This is the second installment in the charming Island Sisters series, set in Britain\u2019s Scilly Isles.\u00a0 Sisters Evie and Margot have taken over an old hotel and are managing it for the owner, though they are on the hook for repairs, which are turning out to be massive.\u00a0 As the book opens, they are a few days out from their grand re-opening, and they are working full tilt to get everything ready in time.<\/p>\n

Because the books are set on the tiny island of Treggarick Rock, accessible only by boat and at certain times because of high or low tide, every story is going to be essentially a locked room mystery.\u00a0 Because the d\u00e9cor of the hotel calls back to the 30\u2019s, this adds a decidedly golden age feel to the proceedings.<\/p>\n

Margot, formerly of LA, gets news that her buddy Louise, a very recent widow, is coming to stay to nurse her wounded heart.\u00a0 When Louise shows up, she\u2019s not grieving that much (she is in fact waiting for the arrival of a new boyfriend), and she\u2019s incredibly high maintenance, refusing to take in the quaint charm of the hotel and instead looking for things like a helipad and high-speed internet (cell phone reception on the island is spotty).<\/p>\n

Louise also comes bearing other news: she\u2019s optioned a book for film, a book that Margot has long wanted to make into a movie, and she seems to have found a financial backer in the form of her new boyfriend, Randy.\u00a0 When Randy shows up, he\u2019s incredibly handsome and fit, and chats as easily with Louise as with Evie and Margot, as well as with the guys working on the electrical systems of the hotel.<\/p>\n

Margot and Evie are working on a shoestring budget, however, and are not sure how Margot can supply any financial backing to the project.\u00a0\u00a0 Things are complicated when one of their employees takes off in their boat for the day and disappears. Increasingly alarmed calls from the man\u2019s girlfriend as to his whereabouts have everyone on edge, and indeed, he is discovered dead.<\/p>\n

Dennison has structured the book so that that murder is discovered just about exactly halfway through.\u00a0 She spends the first half giving a thorough examination of her characters and setting, leading up to the remains of a shipwreck visible only at low tide.\u00a0 It\u2019s on an expedition to see the ship that the body is discovered.\u00a0 The second half is then devoted to investigation.\u00a0 By that time, as a reader, you are totally invested in the characters, in Evie and Margot\u2019s hotel project, and are probably dying to visit the Scilly Isles.<\/p>\n

These books have a very real and enduring charm.\u00a0 I love the two main characters, who are a good yin and yang (Evie is practical, Margot dreams big), and I love everything about the setting.\u00a0 There\u2019s even a map provided in the front of the book to orient the reader to Treggarick Rock \u2013 another golden age touch.\u00a0 This also had a wonderful mystery at the center, character based but with some great clues throughout.\u00a0 This is a standout read.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is the second installment in the charming Island Sisters series, set in Britain\u2019s Scilly Isles.\u00a0 Sisters Evie and Margot have taken over an old hotel and are managing it for the owner, though they are on the hook for repairs, which are turning out to be massive.\u00a0 As the book opens, they are a … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[328,646,423,648,100,647,68],"class_list":["post-4144","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-cozy","tag-danger-at-the-cove","tag-hannah-dennison","tag-island-sisters","tag-minotaur-books","tag-scilly-isles","tag-traditional-mystery"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4144","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4144"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4144\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4147,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4144\/revisions\/4147"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4144"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4144"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4144"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}