Often amusing characters and plenty of red herrings make Byron’s second Cajun Country mystery an entertaining read.
Bridezilla and murder keep an unlucky maid of honor hopping.
Artist Maggie Crozat returned home to help run her family’s B&B at their lovely Crozet plantation in Pelican, Louisiana. Her very pregnant friend, Vanessa Fleer, has proved to be a demanding bride with long lists of outlandish, constantly changing demands. The bridegroom, Rufus Durand, is a suspended police officer whose family has a long-standing grudge against the Crozats. Luckily for Maggie, his cousin Bo, a detective whom Maggie’s quietly dating, isn’t interested in family feuds. Maggie wonders why Vanessa gets hysterical and Rufus laughs when she agrees to house Vanessa’s cousin Ginger Fleer-Starke and her co-workers Trent and Bibi. The entrepreneurial Ginger has built up a business buying, staging, and decorating houses, with Bibi doing most of the work. Even a lawyer recently moved from Houston has heard all about Ginger, who’s sued almost everyone she’s ever met and done nothing but cause trouble and fight with people since she arrived in Pelican. So when Maggie finds Ginger’s dead body in the bayou, there are all too many people who could have killed the manipulative troublemaker. Maggie and her family are lucky to have alibis, since they’ve already been involved in a murder (Plantation Shudders, 2016), and the current police chief has no love for any of them. Maggie feels she must do some sleuthing even though her every minute is taken up with Vanessa’s demands. Maggie also worries about Bo’s first wife, Whitney, who’s staying nearby while her new husband is overseas. A beauty whose autistic son, Xander, continues to connect her to her husband, she clearly has doubts about divorcing Bo. Digging into Ginger’s background yields even more motives, but who did the deadly deed?
Often amusing characters and plenty of red herrings make Byron’s second Cajun Country mystery an entertaining read.Pub Date: Sept. 13, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-629-53768-9
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Crooked Lane
Review Posted Online: June 21, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An anodyne visit with Tricia and her friends and enemies hung on a thin mystery.
Too much free time leads a New Hampshire bookseller into yet another case of murder.
Now that Tricia Miles has Pixie Poe and Mr. Everett practically running her bookstore, Haven’t Got a Clue, she finds herself at loose ends. Her wealthy sister, Angelica, who in the guise of Nigela Ricita has invested heavily in making Stoneham a bookish tourist attraction, is entering the amateur competition for the Great Booktown Bake-Off. So Tricia, who’s recently taken up baking as a hobby, decides to join her and spends a lot of time looking for the perfect cupcake recipe. A visit to another bookstore leaves Tricia witnessing a nasty argument between owner Joyce Widman and next-door neighbor Vera Olson over the trimming of tree branches that hang over Joyce’s yard—also overheard by new town police officer Cindy Pearson. After Tricia accepts Joyce’s offer of some produce from her garden, they find Vera skewered by a pitchfork, and when Police Chief Grant Baker arrives, Joyce is his obvious suspect. Ever since Tricia moved to Stoneham, the homicide rate has skyrocketed (Poisoned Pages, 2018, etc.), and her history with Baker is fraught. She’s also become suspicious about the activities at Pets-A-Plenty, the animal shelter where Vera was a dedicated volunteer. Tricia’s offered her expertise to the board, but president Toby Kingston has been less than welcoming. With nothing but baking on her calendar, Tricia has plenty of time to investigate both the murder and her vague suspicions about the shelter. Plenty of small-town friendships and rivalries emerge in her quest for the truth.
An anodyne visit with Tricia and her friends and enemies hung on a thin mystery.Pub Date: Aug. 13, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-9848-0272-9
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: May 26, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2019
A murder is committed in a stalled transcontinental train in the Balkans, and every passenger has a watertight alibi. But Hercule Poirot finds a way.
**Note: This classic Agatha Christie mystery was originally published in England as Murder on the Orient Express, but in the United States as Murder in the Calais Coach. Kirkus reviewed the book in 1934 under the original US title, but we changed the title in our database to the now recognizable title Murder on the Orient Express. This is the only name now known for the book. The reason the US publisher, Dodd Mead, did not use the UK title in 1934 was to avoid confusion with the 1932 Graham Greene novel, Orient Express.
Pub Date: Feb. 28, 1934
ISBN: 978-0062073495
Page Count: -
Publisher: Dodd, Mead
Review Posted Online: Sept. 20, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1934
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