I've read at least one other Fixer-Upper mystery and watched the Hallmark shows, but I was looking for something free to listen to and found this one. I didn't love it to be honest. Shannon goes out on a blind date that ends badly, with her kneeing him and threatening to kill him - in front of a beach of witnesses. Of course, the guy later turns up dead - in one of the houses her company is remodeling, killed with one of her distinctive pink tools. She is, of course, a suspect and decides she needs to clear her name. Unfortunately, most of the other suspects are women too. The guy was jerk.
I like Shannon in the tv show, but here she seems young. She doesn't learn and continues to threaten to kill people throughout the book (because doesn't everyone) but then is dismayed when they end up murdered, or almost murdered. She still has some kind...
I don't read a lot of romances - I get annoyed with miscommunications that almost seem purposeful, ridiculous grudges, and love triangles. Witches Get Stuff Done was fun, though. After a rather disastrous ferry ride, Riley arrives on Starfall Point Island. She’s expecting to meet her long lost aunt, but instead learns of her aunt’s death and finds herself caretaker to a house full of ghosts. The love interest is a cute, intelligent librarian, Edison. Yes, their first meeting is a bit yucky and maybe they fall in love a little too quickly, but they made me smile. They both have some baggage from past relationships, but don't let it overwhelm the present. They talk to each other honestly and share things. Most of the tension comes from the ghosts and the mysteries surrounding the house.
t's fun to watch Riley find her circle of friends. She's new in town and her aunt always kept pretty aloof from the...
The Meg Langslow series is one I dip in and out of. I've read several, but no where near 37. Meg wears many hats - mom, wife, daughter, blacksmith, mayor's assistant. This time around she's helping prep for the Mutt March. a parade/festival to promote pet adoptions from the local shelters. She's taking a break from the chaos at her house by going over the her brother's - just in time for the backhoe digging out the duck pond to uncover a human arm bone.
This is a long-running series with lots of returning characters. Andrews does a good job at giving us enough information to know who is who and their relationships to each other, but not so much that it bogs the book down. I think this would work as a stand alone, but as with most series, the more you've read the more you know about, and hopefully enjoy, the characters and town.
As far as the case...
The blurb is a little misleading. Charlie is actually intending on surfing, although she can barely stand up on the board, in hopes of winning one of the raffle prizes. So she is right there when one of the surfers is found dead, stabbed while on his board. When Charlie realizes that her friend, Vesper, will be one of the cops' main suspects, she decides she has to investigate. Her boyfriend/ police detective is also on the case which makes it a bit awkward.
I don't know. This one was fun. Charlie was her usual entertaining self; Rosie and Dot are as resourceful as ever; Jake is (almost) following the rules, but I just didn't enjoy it as much as some of the others. Maybe it was because the dead man was one of the charming jerks that women know will cheat on them but date him anyway, He also wasn't making great business decisions, so we have plenty of suspects....
This one might have been my favorite of the series so far. Not because of the plot necessarily - Pleiti is helping a friend who is concerned about potential threats to her cousin who is up for a promotion at another university- but because of the language and the Holmes/Watson vibes, both of which are so much more noticeable in this installment. I will say that this does work as a stand-alone although one of the major events from the first is referenced and carries some importance.
The series is set on Jupiter, which was settled after Earth's atmosphere became uninhabitable. Pleiti is a professor in the classics department, studying what life was like on earth in the hopes of eventually returning, which makes a nice contrast with the modernists she meets, who are more interested in studying the now and how people and animals are adapting. But people are still people, with jealousies and secrets, which means people like...
I didn't realize this was the 5th in the series when I picked it up, but it worked well as a stand-alone. Mandy, the owner of a dry cleaning shop, apparently has a habit of getting involved in murders. This time she has agreed to clean and alter her ex-husband's new bride's wedding dress. But when she delvers it to the hotel on the day of the wedding, she ends up a suspect in the bride's murder. Being the amateur sleuth that she is, she decides she has to get to the bottom of it, even if her boyfriend, Detective Stan Foster, wants her to stay far away.
We've got plenty of suspects, clues, and red herrings. The people surrounding Mandy are appropriately quirky, especially her mom and her employee, Betty, who get in all kind of trouble. I did get annoyed at how often Betty was described as a former bag lady and not listened to. Like, yes, I get...
