Reading Fanatic Reviews
All Mystery, Suspense, and Thriller ReviewsThe Viscount’s Mystery by Joyce Alec
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The Viscount's Mystery*
Mysterious Viscount and Sibling Pact
Even though this book is called The Viscount’s Mystery, we don’t meet the viscount until after 12% of the book. Instead, we meet Charlotte and her brother. She considers herself a bluestocking who would be content to remain a spinster, but her brother wishes her to marry, and in fact, insists she does so before he weds. She is tired of her brother’s interference, so they make a pact. At the next ball, she will accept dances and discussions with a variety gentleman, and if she is good to her word, he will refrain—going forward—from mentioning her unmarried state and desires for her life. If he fails in this regard, she has the right to pick the girl he will court. She very firmly believes that she will win this. She’s out walking with a friend before this ball when they happen upon a man who is being roundly beaten by two other men. At some peril to herself, Charlotte stops the assault and brings the man back to her brother’s place for treatment. The man is mysterious, not wanting to go with her, not wanting help, and not wanting to reveal his name. He does stay there for some days under her care.
What will happen with the brother and sister’s pact? Who is this mysterious injured man? What role will he play in Charlotte’s life?
I enjoyed watching the brother’s and sister’s interactions in this story. Charlotte is very determined, much to her brother’s chagrin. Charlotte and Michael, the unknown injured man, have a feisty push-me, pull-you interaction. For her, there is definitely something intriguing about the man about whom she knows so little. Perhaps his anonymity makes her more candid than she would be in another situation.
This is the third book that I’ve read by this author. While I wasn’t so wild about one of them, I enjoyed the first one that I read and this one. In particular in this book, I enjoyed Charlotte’s character. One thing does seem strange to me. All of this author’s books that I’ve seen clearly stated on the cover that they are Regency, but inside at the start of each book, she just puts 19th century England. The Regency is a very short, very specific time in English history, from 1811 to 1820. If you’re going to be as specific as Regency on the cover, why would you be no more accurate than a hundred years’ span on the inside? I just don’t get it.
That said, I enjoyed Charlotte’s story and her pact with her brother as well as her trying to figure out the viscount’s mysteriousness and his mystery.
House of Scarabs by Hazel Longuet
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House of Scarabs*
Immersive, Fast-Paced Read that Harkens Back to Ancient Egypt
Ben and Ellie have come to an out-of-the-way bookshop in a small town in England. After a pleasant time, as they’re walking out of the bookstore, they make accidental contact with a man coming in. Immediately, they seem to be transported far away in a strange sphere. They each receive an ancient Egyptian symbol and are then whisked away back to the present. A shadowy group of whom we know nothing seems to know that this has happened, even before the participants debrief, and mobilize to negate the group. Soon, Ben, Ellie, and Gerhardt are in a fight for their very lives that takes them from England to Egypt, all the while trying to understand what precisely has happened to them and what it means.
I read the prequel to this book first, Genesis. I really enjoyed immersing myself into a different and magical culture made real by descriptions of that very different world. The author pulled me into this book right away as well, even in the more familiar surrounding of a bookshop. She has a way of describing things that is very visual, so I can very plainly see both the usual and the unusual, yet the descriptions don’t seem over-wrought. Too often, I see writers who seem to use adjectives and adverbs as a crutch for not being able to find the right word, whereas this writer is able to choose words of all categories that are strong and make the world come alive for the reader with seeming ease. She is even able to make the more magical, otherworldly elements of this book seem wholly real.
This book is fast-paced, and oh, what a ride it is! I became absolutely immersed in its world and was loath to come out. I hope Ms. Longuet has a sequel up her sleeve; I will be one of the first in line to read it.
Beauty in Death by D. E. Dennis
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Beauty in Death*
Who Killed Beauty?
Beauty, daughter of a wealthy family, is not enjoying her 21st birthday party; nothing is up to her standards. But soon, Beauty is dead, and Grimm investigations is helping the family figure out who did this.
Who killed Beauty? What other Secrets will tracking down the killer reveal?
If you read the previous book in the series, you are familiar with Michael and Monica Grimm’s PI company. They help people on both sides of their community’s social spectrum, the regular folks in Castle Rock and the wealthy people in Fairy Tails. As in the first book, I quite enjoyed the interaction and banter between the brother and sister investigation team. The way they interact reminds me so much of the interactions in my own family, so I found that fun to read. We learn more about their family in this book, which I enjoyed. I like how this book and the previous book are slowly revealing more and more about this unique and mysterious place where fairy tales live but often take on a macabre bent.
By the way, I loved the tiny bit written from Beauty’s perspective! Oh, my gosh! You could just tell how self-centered and unpleasant she was. Not an easy task to show a narrator’s true colors when they are not the best of people. I just wish there was more of it. Kudos to the author on that little portion of the book.
If you enjoy cozy mysteries that are wholly invested in the real world yet contain just a hint of myth and fairytales, you might enjoy this book and this series.
The Darkness by Brittney Leigh
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The Darkness*
Bulwark from a Teen’s Perspective
This is my third book in the Bulwark anthology, and it is certainly different from the ones by Brit Lunden. This is actually a YA novella. We see Bulwark through the eyes of a teenager keeping a diary. Strange things are afoot at Bulwark’s high school, including a peculiar smell coming out of a locker. What’s going on at the high school?
This book had me for the first 20%, as I thought, finally, I had found an author who could do diary format correctly. I’m always a bit disappointed when authors writing in this style break out into dialogue. As one who has journaled or kept a diary for a significant part of my life, I can say that I never, ever write in dialogue with full quote marks and dialogue tags. So I always hate, hate, hate it when I see it in literature. The first 20% of this book swept me back to when I kept a diary when I was in high school. I love how the author got right into this girl’s head and really give us a sense of her thoughts and emotions. But then at that 20% mark, the dialogue started creeping in. Sigh. I know an author might not want to keep strictly to the diary format for literary purposes, but if you’re going to break into dialogue, why not make the book a mixture of proper scenes and then diary musings?
That personal pet peeve aside, I found this novella to be a fun glimpse into a teenage girl’s mind. It was very creative, and I could completely identify with much of what she thought and experienced. The author did an excellent job conveying how a diary can express the rawness of emotion and thought, as well as shifting moods and beliefs.
Seduction of My Rake by Dawn Brower
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Seduction of My Rake*
Love-Hate Relationship Between Hero & Heroine
This book won’t make sense unless you read the previous book in the series, Searching for My Rogue. It is Regina and Bradford’s story. The prologue sets up that Regina’s marriage to Trenton is already on the rocks after just a few months; they will be divorcing. Regina can’t quite let go of the disappearance of her sister Alys, so she goes back to the Duke of Weston’s estate to look into it. She and the duke have an attraction to each other (almost love-hate), which they pursue, along with answers about Alys.
I didn’t particularly like this book because of a few factors. First, I just didn’t like the characters of Regina and Bradford. They’re not very nice people, and for people who are supposed to be starting to care about each other, they treat each other abominably. This book, too, takes place wholly in the present, unlike the previous two books of the series. The principals’ do banter, but it isn’t nearly as amusing as book two because it seems more hateful. There were some errors in grammar and punctuation, but they were not as marked as the first book and not quite as good as the second.
The Case of Billy’s Missing Gun by S. J. Slagle
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The Case of Billy's Missing Gun*
Missing Gun Plays Second (or Third) Fiddle
Private investigator Lucy James has had a few cases, but not a lot of money is coming in. A man hires her to try to track down a missing gun, which he states belonged to Billy the Kid. Lucy’s dad gets fired from his job as a children’s television show presenter. Lucy’s best friend is getting married and involves Lucy in the planning. Lucy’s on-again-off-again boyfriend shows up as well.
Will Lucy find the missing gun? Will it be Billy the Kid’s gun? What will her father do about his job? What other people and events will keep Lucy from focusing on her career?
Unfortunately, this book is more cozy than mystery with all the peripheral events going on in Lucy’s life that seem to take precedence over her job of finding the gun. I think sometimes it is hard for cozy mysteries to balance both aspects of the genre. I would have liked to have seen the more action and conflict in general and more about the gun that’s mentioned in the title specifically. Instead, the book seems to focus more on Lucy’s private life with all that is going on with her father, her friend, and her boyfriend.
The book has more than the typical number of issues with grammar, punctuation, and usage. Commas seem to be specifically problematic, as they were always missing around the coordinating conjunction that joins two independent clauses in a compound sentence. The use of hyphens did not follow standard usage rules. The book was rife with false subject and impersonal passive sentence constructions. There was awkward phrasing as well (“My open mouth closed and frowned”), and an over-reliance on certain pet words like *smirk*. Smirk and sneer are two words that I think are overused in fiction, and they were overused here; once, both were used in the same sentence!
The book was also a strange combination of narrative prose and dialogue in a couple of different ways. It is a pitfall of first-person perspective that there can be long narrative prose passages without any breaks of short paragraphs or dialogue. Yet, there were some sections of the narrative prose were too choppy, with a lot of single line paragraphs or short paragraphs in a row. These alternating issues with narrative prose happened often in this book, which made it more difficult to read. The dialogue sections had the latter problem as well. These sections were often just line after line of short back-and-forth between characters. Also, there didn’t seem to be much to distinguish the speech between different characters.
The Tower Card Murder by Mika Kosey
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The Tower Card Murder*
True Psychic Connects with True Skeptic
Dee is a young woman with real psychic abilities. She sees auras, can hear dead people, and has a true intuitive sense of how to use the tarot cards. When we meet her, she’s waking up from a dream that she’s had the past couple of nights where she’s at an ancient feast with five men, and she is being asked to choose. Upon awakening, though she needs to go to her work as a tarot reader at a local store, she quickly does her own tarot card of the day and comes up with The Tower, reversed. She’s a bit startled by this as well as the intense energy that seems to be around it. On the way to the store, she hears her dead father telling her to get out, and she sees a creepy guy watching her. At the store, Dr. Shayne Hollande comes in and asks for a reading. He’s an academic who wants to discover for himself if psychics are fake. When she starts his reading, cards come up that suggests her and the doctor’s connection, and this is quickly followed by a repeat of the reversed Tower card. She has a minor flip-out moment and promptly leaves.
What is the connection between Dee and Dr. Shayne? What change or destruction will play out in her life as suggested by the tower card? What of her dream about the five then?
My only complaint about the book is that the author uses a fair amount of profanity that added nothing to the plot or characterization. I don’t mind a little contextual profanity, but if it just seems to be thrown in, it detracts from a story for me.
I enjoy the tarot myself, so I appreciated how well this author integrated the use of the tarot into the book. Tarot is often used in fantasy novels, but I’ve rarely seen it so intricately woven into the fabric of a story as it is in this one. While I don’t always agree with the author’s interpretation of the cards, I understand that such is necessary for this particular plot. I think, too, that the author did an excellent job showing how someone with psychic abilities uses and things about them. As the narrator, Dee expresses the things that she sees and hears outside of the usual five senses as easily as if she were describing the standard ways of perception, which of course for Dee, these are an everyday happenstance. I love reading about how she could sense auras and energy in such a natural and organic way.
The Chronicler and Mr. Smith by Angie Martin
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The Chronicler and Mr. Smith*
Mr. Smith’s (and Ms. Shaw’s) Wild Ride
Madison Shaw, a New York Times best-selling romance author, meets a mysterious man when she’s promoting her latest book. He doesn’t appear to be a fan, and when he interviews her like a book blogger, the questions he asks mostly aren’t about the book. He ends with asking her some rather bizarre questions that are intensely personal but meaningful to her. He wants her to come with him for her protection, but she refuses, so he gives her his card and asks her to call if she needs him. Soon, Madison is wrapped up in a paranormal world she had no clue existed beyond the fantasy of books and movies.
What a ride this book is! The author has such a masterfully fluid writing style that she pulled me right in, even though I’m not the greatest fan of first-person perspective writing. The voice of Madison is right on target, wholly unique and seems to belong to a three-dimensional person. Mr. Smith is mysterious, though he is an apt guide through the world that Madison will soon be going through.
If you enjoy paranormal NON romance that’s a bit of a thriller with surprising twists and turns and characters that feel wholly real in an unreal world, you might enjoy this fantastic read.
Cupcakes and Killers by Laina Turner
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Cupcakes and Killers*
Who Would Kill an Old Man?
Read Wine is open for business and appears to be doing well. Patrons especially love the cupcakes. Unfortunately, one of their elderly customers dies right in the shop after he’s enjoying one. Though this man is a senior citizen, making one assume his death is from natural causes, it is soon determined that he died from poisoning. Steven and the stalker are still around and causing problems. Cora and Jonathan are planning their wedding. The ladies discover that Jonathan has been keeping a secret.
Who would poison an elderly man? What will happen with Steven? How about the stalker?
Just like the first book, even though there are mystery elements, this doesn’t really feel like a true cozy mystery to me. It feels more like chick lit with a little bit of mystery and intrigue thrown in. That’s not necessarily a bad thing as long as you know what you’re getting into. I do like to watch the relationships between three women. The series is a little different than most because it has continuing elements that span multiple books, like the stalker and Steven, but still has a standalone mystery within each novel.
Hidden Entity by Wendy Meadows
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Hidden Entity*
Things That Go Bump on Fright Night
At the B&B, they’re putting on a special Halloween Fright Night. The crew works extra hard to create decorations and food as well as prepare stories to tell on their ghost walk tour through the building. People are staying at the B&B just to have the complete experience. And what an adventure they get when, as the ghost tours are happening, strange sounds and laughter are heard that seem to be coming out of nowhere. It’s all in good Halloween fun, right? But things are not as they seem when one of the guests turns up murdered. Then while doing an investigation, a hidden tunnel is found, but Brenda is not alone…
Who murdered the guest? Is it the crazy-looking guy in the tunnel? What is up with those strange sounds? Is anyone else in danger?
I enjoyed the setup of this book, as we get to meet each of the overnight guests as they sign in. It reminded me of Clue, where a strange cast of characters comes together, and in this fishbowl, much can go awry… especially on Halloween! This small town, even without B&B guests, has a fantastic set of quirky characters, and I love to see the interactions between couples and friends. Despite how murdery this town seems, I think it might be fun to live there.
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