{"id":5696,"date":"2024-05-05T08:44:09","date_gmt":"2024-05-05T15:44:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/?p=5696"},"modified":"2024-05-05T08:44:09","modified_gmt":"2024-05-05T15:44:09","slug":"catherine-mack-every-time-i-go-on-vacation-some-one-dies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/catherine-mack-every-time-i-go-on-vacation-some-one-dies\/","title":{"rendered":"Catherine Mack: Every Time I Go on Vacation, Some One Dies"},"content":{"rendered":"

Vacation Mysteries #1<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>This book takes the form of a very traditional mystery, and turns it on it\u2019s head, standing back a bit to look with fondness at the genre.\u00a0 There are other writers looking at mysteries in the same way \u2013 Elle Cosimano, Anthony Horowitz, Kat Ailes, Benjamin Stevenson and to and extent, Kemper Donovan \u2013 but like Cosimano, Ailes and Stevenson, Mack\u2019s take is humorous.\u00a0 These are not stories written by dumb people.\u00a0 The stories are smart and the mysteries are clever and tricky, with fairly laid out turns of the plot.\u00a0 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.<\/p>\n

Eleanor is a major bestselling author.\u00a0 She got her start almost transcribing an adventure she had with a long ago boyfriend as they unraveled a series of Italian robberies and were able to point the police to the culprits.\u00a0 The boyfriend, Connor, whose name she didn\u2019t change in the book, is the swoony secondary character, and now, ten books in, he\u2019s also an anchor around her neck.\u00a0 They\u2019ve long ago parted company but because she used his name, he comes in for a cut of her massive royalties, plus he\u2019s a huge fan favorite on her book tours.<\/p>\n

The book takes place on a tour of Italy with Eleanor\u2019s fans \u2013 the self named \u201cBookface\u201d ladies \u2013 who are accompanying Eleanor and a small group of other writers as they tour the country and do some serious eating and drinking together.\u00a0 The tour includes book signings and \u201ctime\u201d with Eleanor.\u00a0 Eleanor is accompanied, as always, by her sister Harper, who works as her incredibly organized and capable assistant.\u00a0 The two have been close ever since their parents died when they were fairly young, and Eleanor is almost a sister-mom to Harper, though Harper also seems to serve that role herself despite being the baby sister.<\/p>\n

The book includes snarky side comments in the form of footnotes \u2013 if you find those irritating you could skip them, but they are pretty funny.\u00a0 She does sometimes point out \u201cthis is a clue\u201d or \u201cI\u2019m foreshadowing\u201d and some of the reveals about her relationship with Connor come in the footnotes.\u00a0 Along with them on the tour is another writer, Oliver, Eleanor\u2019s true love, who she shoved aside as she has trouble handling her feeling or dealing with commitment.<\/p>\n

The main mystery involves some repeated death threats to Connor, though Eleanor is slow to believe he\u2019s not making it up.\u00a0 A few too many incidents seem to point in that direction, though, and Eleanor may also be a target.\u00a0 When someone is murdered (way too late) in the story, the group assumes the role of amateur detectives, making charts and figuring motives.<\/p>\n

The pleasure of this book is the setting and the characters, drawn well by the author, and the humor, which erupts on every page.\u00a0 Mack is not a tight plotter, however, and the book is in fact laced with references to the fact that as a writer, she\u2019s a \u201cpantser\u201d (i.e., she writes by the seat of her pants), not a plotter, which seems evident though the wrap up to the story is pretty well done.\u00a0 She also, for the hard core mystery fan, drops references to some of the fan cons beloved by mystery readers \u2013 Bouchercon, Left Coast, and Killer Nashville.<\/p>\n

I felt it was a tad long and the murder should have come sooner but this is still a fun read.\u00a0 The author points out to the reader she\u2019s a liar, making you think, and she does use beloved tropes with affection \u2013 the suspects gathered in the library, the somewhat foolish policeman, the gathering of everyone at the end to reveal the killer \u2013 which leads me to wonder what will happen in book two.\u00a0 This one ends on a cliffhanger, so stay tuned.\u00a0 —\u00a0Robin Agnew<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Vacation Mysteries #1 This book takes the form of a very traditional mystery, and turns it on it\u2019s head, standing back a bit to look with fondness at the genre.\u00a0 There are other writers looking at mysteries in the same way \u2013 Elle Cosimano, Anthony Horowitz, Kat Ailes, Benjamin Stevenson and to and extent, Kemper … 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":[1057,1677,1680,1678,359,100,1276,1679,68,1681],"class_list":["post-5696","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-amateur-sleuth","tag-catherine-mack","tag-eleanor-dash","tag-every-time-i-go-on-vacation","tag-italy","tag-minotaur-books","tag-robin-agnew","tag-some-one-dies","tag-traditional-mystery","tag-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5696","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=5696"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5696\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5698,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5696\/revisions\/5698"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}