Monday, October 26, 2020

Little Bookshop of Murder

Title: Little Bookshop of Murder
Author: Maggie Blackburn (aka Mollie Cox Bryan)
Published: September 8th 2020 by Crooked Lane Books
Format: eBook, Hardcover 329 pages
Genre: Cozy Mystery
Series: Beach Reads Mystery #1

Repetitious, inconsistent, no diversion or secondary plotline, and most frustrating of all, it was easily solved halfway through the book. So why did I finish the book? I am asking myself the same question, and I think it boils down to hope. I kept hoping that I was wrong. I kept hoping that there was something that I missed and would zing me at the end. That didn’t happen, and all that was left was a book that needed more time with an editor and a few wasted hours.

Summer Merriweather mentions that she is a Shakespearean scholar about a gazillion times, which becomes tedious and does not help and only tends to annoy the reader and the people around her. She then must dwell on the goings-on at her Virginia University, where she is on sabbatical due to her fear of spiders (of all things) and her University’s odd response. Hiding out in England under the auspice of research, she receives a call that her mother, Hildy, otherwise healthy, had died of a sudden heart attack. Returning home to Brigid’s Island, NC, apparently instantaneously, for the funeral, Summer begins to question the death when threats appear. Threats that Hildy had been dealing with regarding the selling her beloved bookstore, Beach Reads.

Trying to fulfilling the standards when it comes to cozy mysteries, Maggie Blackburn checks all the boxes. Small town, returning home, pet, friends, past boyfriend, etc. If only there had been something new or a few clues had been hidden. This series will be a pass for me.

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