Sloan works at a craft brewery in the Pacific Northwest. The town has a faux-Bavarian ambiance and attracts a lot of tourists. I enjoy spending time in the town and with Sloan and her friends and family. I love how the town actually likes its tourists and how the townspeople all know and look out for each other. Of course, quirky characters and a good setting can just about carry any cozy mystery - thankfully.
Our victim here is a housekeeper at a local hotel, but that investigation is overshadowed by the return of a woman from Sloan's past claiming to be her aunt. Honestly, I hope we're finally done with all the stuff from Sloan's childhood. It all seems unlikely and over the top and detracts from a good series. If the author could just keep the focus on the murders in the town, and not veer off into organized crime or drugs or whatever, I'd be much happier. Sloan's present...
I enjoy every visit to the Scottish Bookshop. Delaney and her friends, and her new husband, Tom, are just a lot of fun to spend time with. Delaney works at The Cracked Spine in Edinburgh, a book store/warehouse full of neat stuff. Delaney can't pass up Shelagh O'Conner's tresure hunt. First, a treasure hunt is right up her alley or close, since we're in Scotland. Second, Shelagh's library is fabulous. But when a man is killed and Shelagh is kidnapped, Delaney feels like finding the treasure may help them find Shelagh. So Delaney and her friends are working on deciphering the treasure hunt clues while trying to catch a killer and save Shelagh.
All the characters are well-developed and engaging. Their interactions feel real and I like a.) that Delaney shares everything with the police and b.) that people are given the benefit of a doubt. Just because someone doesn't tell you something you think is important, doesn't mean they...
Sloan Krause and her business partner Garrett are ready to make their Nitro Brewery opening into a bed and breakfast. They plan on a soft opening, but things get out of hand when a lack of local hotel rooms means they end up with a full house. When one of the guests is discovered missing the following morning, and her room ransacked, Sloan immediately calls the police chief. With the guests as the prime suspects, Sloan must use her resources to find out what is going on, and keep the business thriving. I like while Sloan helps solve the mystery, she always lets the police take the lead. She serves as an extra set of eyes and ears, but always shares her information with the police chief. Sloan is good at listening and talking to people, which is how she picks up clues.
The mystery was well done. There were several suspects and a couple of twists. Everything pulled together well...
The Cabinets of Barnaby Mayne by Elsa Hart is an old-fashioned mystery, set in early 18th century London. History is poised between the advent of modern science and the superstitions and fantasy of previous eras. Collectors - almost always men - searched the world for things, animal remains, plants, rocks, oddities to showcase in their homes. Or paid others to do the searching for them. They wanted prestige, social status, as much if not more than they wanted to further knowledge. They guarded their treasures, competed with other collectors, and spent much of their time arguing over provenance and ownership.
Barnaby Mayne is one of England’s greatest collectors, and his house a confusing, claustrophobic place where anything, even murder, can happen. Honestly, as much as i love funky museums, the Mayne collection seems a bit creepy. Lady Cecily Kay has come to the house to view its plants. There she meets a woman she had known as a child, Meacon, a...
The Stolen Letter is the fifth of the Scottish Bookshop Mysteries. I've read all of them, and while you could jump in at this one, you'd miss seeing Delaney, our amateur sleuth, starting her adventure, new in town, to finding a second family at the bookshop, falling in love, and really making her dreams come true. This time around she meets Mary Stewart, a woman who looks almost exactly like her, but 20 years older. Mary believes she's a reincarnation of Mary, Queen of Scots. I loved how the Queen's story was woven into a current day murder mystery. This series often includes a slight mystical element, but they never, well rarely, jump into the truly paranormal. They are all definitely cozy mysteries, with very real “whodunits.”
I love the setting. Delaney works in the mysterious, yet inviting bookshop, The Cracked Spine. I love spending time with Delaney and the other staff of the shop. They are all charming and...
I'm not a beer drinker, but my husband and our friends are, so I hear a lot of beer talk. Fall is his favorite time of year for beer, and I think that was part of the reason I was attracted to Beyond a Reasonable Stout. I enjoyed learning a bit more about the brewing process; it's interesting and while I realized a lot had to go into it, I've never really read anything about the process. Oktoberfest is over and Sloan and Garrett are starting to work on their winter beers. Leavenworth is a town whose livelihood is the tourist industry and that centers around their craft breweries and their Bavarian-style town. It actually sounds like it would be a fun place to visit.
And then Kristopher Cooper gets killed. Granted, just about everyone in town was angry at the anti-alcohol platform he was running on for re-election to city council, but who took it all the way to...
