An inn owner’s dead-body problem provides a welcome distraction from her domestic chores.
The renovations to seaside Maine’s Oyster Cove Guesthouse hit a bump when the two resident cats, Nero and Marlowe, start wailing something terrible. Josie Waters is sure the cats can't have found another body: She hasn’t even served her guests breakfast. But when carpenter Ed O’Hara calls her to the wall demolition, sure enough, there’s a skeleton inside. Her background training as a medical examiner tells Josie that the skeleton is very, very old and nothing to be afraid of, unless of course it affects her business. Suddenly the town is abuzz with rumors that the skeleton is that of town patriarch Jedediah Biddeford, who’s long been suspected of burying treasure somewhere nearby. Now Josie’s certain her yard is going to be full of holes while her difficult guests, the Biddeford family, join the locals in hunting for the bounty. Will they even keep their shovels in the shed? A dirty floor turns out to be the least of Josie’s worries after one of the Biddefords is killed by a shovel to the head. Two deaths on her property seems like a lot to handle, but the interspersed dialogue between the feline detectives shows that Josie can expect help unraveling the case, which she thinks must be tied to the rest of the Biddefords and their struggling cheese-sculpting business. Josie seems more likely to solve the case than she is to remember to take her bread out of the oven. Over and over again.
Dobbs’ signature sense of humor lifts this above the sea of cat cozies.Pub Date: Jan. 12, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-5387-3621-0
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: Nov. 18, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2020
Did you like this book?
A convicted killer’s list of five people he wants dead runs the gamut from the wife he’s already had murdered to franchise heroine Ali Reynolds.
Back in the day, women came from all over to consult Santa Clarita fertility specialist Dr. Edward Gilchrist. Many of them left his care happily pregnant, never dreaming that the father of the babies they carried was none other than the physician himself, who donated his own sperm rather than that of the handsome, athletic, disease-free men pictured in his scrapbook. When Alexandra Munsey’s son, Evan, is laid low by the kidney disease he’s inherited from his biological father and she returns to Gilchrist in search of the donor’s medical records, the roof begins to fall in on him. By the time it’s done falling, he’s serving a life sentence in Folsom Prison for commissioning the death of his wife, Dawn, the former nurse and sometime egg donor who’d turned on him. With nothing left to lose, Gilchrist tattoos himself with the initials of five people he blames for his fall: Dawn; Leo Manuel Aurelio, the hit man he’d hired to dispose of her; Kaitlyn Todd, the nurse/receptionist who took Dawn’s place; Alex Munsey, whose search for records upset his apple cart; and Ali Reynolds, the TV reporter who’d helped put Alex in touch with the dozen other women who formed the Progeny Project because their children looked just like hers. No matter that Ali’s been out of both California and the news business for years; Gilchrist and his enablers know that revenge can’t possibly be served too cold. Wonder how far down that list they’ll get before Ali, aided once more by Frigg, the methodical but loose-cannon AI first introduced in Duel to the Death (2018), turns on them?
Proficient but eminently predictable. Amid all the time shifts and embedded backstories, the most surprising feature is how little the boundary-challenged AI, who gets into the case more or less inadvertently, differs from your standard human sidekick with issues.Pub Date: April 2, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5011-5101-9
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Feb. 19, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2019
Did you like this book?
Christmas is coming, but so is trouble for South Lick, Indiana.
Robbie Jordan, owner and chief cook at Pans ’N Pancakes, returns from solving a murder in California just in time for the holiday rush, which is complicated more than most Christmastimes by a number of surprises that disrupt her circle of friends. First, her assistant, Danna Beedle, gets a visit from Marcus Vandemere, a young biracial man claiming to be her half brother, an assertion that thrills Danna despite the doubts of some friends and relatives. Next comes a fire that nearly destroys the home of anesthesiologist Dr. William Geller, a racist whose wife, Tina, reportedly left him years ago. When a skeleton turns up in the attic, the not-so-esteemed doctor has some explaining to do. Robbie’s nemesis, Detective Octavia Slade, who recently married Robbie’s former boyfriend, is more willing than usual to accept help from Robbie, who has a knack for finding things out. The next to die is Tina’s twin, Toni, who knew Marcus from karate classes. Toni’s husband is the prime suspect, but Robbie’s convinced the fatalities are connected. With help from her boyfriend and her network of friends, she attempts to clear things up before the killer spoils her holiday by adding her to his list.
The lavish food descriptions and appended recipes are the best parts of this anemic mystery.Pub Date: Sept. 29, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-4967-2317-8
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Kensington
Review Posted Online: July 1, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2020
Did you like this book?
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2021 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
