Author: Liza Tully
Published: July 8, 2025 by Berkley
Format: Kindle, Hardcover 400 Pages
Genre: Mystery
Source: My thanks to Netgalley and the Publisher for the opportunity to read an advanced copy of this book.
Series: Merritt & Blunt Mysteries (#1)
Blurb: Olivia Blunt doesn't want to be an assistant detective for the rest of her life. She's determined to learn everything she can from her mentor and renowned investigator, Aubrey Merritt, but the latter is no easy grader.
After weeks of fielding phone calls from parties desperate for the world-renowned detective’s help, a case comes across Olivia’s desk that just might be worthy of Merritt’s skills. On the evening of her sixty-fifth birthday party, Victoria Summersworth somehow fell over her balcony railing to her death on the rocky shore of Lake Champlain. She was a happy woman—rich, beloved, in love, and matriarch of the preeminent Summersworth family. The police have ruled it a suicide, but her daughter Haley thinks it was murder.
Merritt is ever the skeptic, but Olivia believes Haley. Plus, she’s desperate to prove her investigative skills to her aloof boss. But the Summersworth family drama is a complicated web.
Olivia realizes she might be in over her head with this whole detective thing... or she might be unravelling a mystery even bigger than the one she’d started with.
My Opinion: I made it to 17%—about 70 pages—and then tapped out. Not because I’m impatient, but because I kept waiting for something, anything, to spark. A moment of intrigue. A character worth rooting for. A reason to turn the page. But nope. Nothing.
The setup had promise: Olivia Blunt, a lifelong detective fangirl, lands a gig as assistant to the legendary Aubrey Merritt. That should’ve been a recipe for quirky banter, clever cases, and at least one compelling dynamic. Instead, it’s a slow drip of dull dialogue and lifeless scenes. The pacing is sluggish, the tone flat, and the characters? Cardboard cutouts with no emotional pull.
It’s not just that the story moves slowly; it’s that it asks the reader to care without offering anything in return. No tension, no charm, no spark. I wanted to like it. But Liza Tully took a solid concept and buried it under a mountain of missed opportunities.
If you're hoping for a witty mystery with engaging leads, keep walking. This one’s all hype, no payoff.
After weeks of fielding phone calls from parties desperate for the world-renowned detective’s help, a case comes across Olivia’s desk that just might be worthy of Merritt’s skills. On the evening of her sixty-fifth birthday party, Victoria Summersworth somehow fell over her balcony railing to her death on the rocky shore of Lake Champlain. She was a happy woman—rich, beloved, in love, and matriarch of the preeminent Summersworth family. The police have ruled it a suicide, but her daughter Haley thinks it was murder.
Merritt is ever the skeptic, but Olivia believes Haley. Plus, she’s desperate to prove her investigative skills to her aloof boss. But the Summersworth family drama is a complicated web.
Olivia realizes she might be in over her head with this whole detective thing... or she might be unravelling a mystery even bigger than the one she’d started with.
My Opinion: I made it to 17%—about 70 pages—and then tapped out. Not because I’m impatient, but because I kept waiting for something, anything, to spark. A moment of intrigue. A character worth rooting for. A reason to turn the page. But nope. Nothing.
The setup had promise: Olivia Blunt, a lifelong detective fangirl, lands a gig as assistant to the legendary Aubrey Merritt. That should’ve been a recipe for quirky banter, clever cases, and at least one compelling dynamic. Instead, it’s a slow drip of dull dialogue and lifeless scenes. The pacing is sluggish, the tone flat, and the characters? Cardboard cutouts with no emotional pull.
It’s not just that the story moves slowly; it’s that it asks the reader to care without offering anything in return. No tension, no charm, no spark. I wanted to like it. But Liza Tully took a solid concept and buried it under a mountain of missed opportunities.
If you're hoping for a witty mystery with engaging leads, keep walking. This one’s all hype, no payoff.
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