Crime for the Books by Kate Young (Book Beginnings & Friday 56)

 

Title: Crime for the Books

Author: Kate Young

Publication: 11 October 2022

Format: Kindle eARC via Crooked Lane Books & NetGalley

Amazon Description

Lyla Moody and her book club, the Jane Does, are hosting a Halloween party at Magnolia Manor, tailored after Agatha Christie’s A Murder is Announced, but when the lights come on after the staged murder, a real victim lies dead with a gunshot wound in her chest. The victim was an estranged relative of Elaine Morgan, operator of the B&B, who’d earlier been seen arguing with her about the fate of the property. Suspicion immediately falls on Elaine, and she’s arrested.
 
The Jane Does believe Elaine is innocent, and when they get the chance to team up with police officer Rosa Landry—a member of the club—they jump on it. But then, the club discovers that two more murders have been brazenly predicted online and in the Sweet Mountain Gazette—and that one of the intended victims is Rosa.
 
Lyla thinks she knows who the killer is, but the only way to find out is by laying a trap using Rosa as bait. But, like an Agatha Christie mystery, the truth is never what it seems. Lyla and her trusty book club will have to sleuth out the killer before Rosa meets her final chapter.

Ramble-y Teaserish Stuff

Yet again, Kate Young has made me go off my "read all of the Christies in order" plan and jump ahead from 1928's The Mystery of the Blue Train to 1950's A Murder is Announced. It's a re-read for me and also happens to be one of my favorite episodes of Agatha Christie's Marple with Geraldine McEwan playing Miss Marple. Sure, they made quite a few changes, but the cast is freaking phenomenal and I've rewatched it several times.

The long and the short of it: an announcement is placed in a local paper of a murder that is going to occur at a local residence and it is assumed by many to be an invitation to some sort of murder mystery party. Of course, it isn't, and an actual murder occurs and ....

Matthew Goode. Zoë Wanamaker. Keeley Hawes. Elaine Paige. Geraldine McEwan (my favorite Marple) .... and Catherine Tate as Mitzi. 

Read the book, of course. It's a good one. In spite of the changes, the episode is also a kick and appears to be readily available on all sorts of services. (There are, of course, multiple versions with multiple Marples .... the McEwan will always be my favorite off-the-page.)

Of course, we're not really here for the Agatha Christie ... though, really, one can never have too much.

This is the third installment of Kate Young's Jane Doe Book Club Mystery series and the book club is hosting an Agatha Christie themed murder mystery party at a local B&B. 

Sounds cozy, right? 

The ramble I did about the second in the series went into all the "why"s about this being a cozy series ...  but also the "why"s into how it is soooo not typical. [That one also included a bonus Christie read -- it really isn't any wonder why I love Kate Young so dang much.] I would probably call them more "cozy suspense thrillers" as every installment so far has kept me right at the edge of my seat and made my heart race in the way that most cozies don't -- but suspense thrillers do. 

There are some bits I probably would have cut from this. Like, there's a bit too much Brad ... but I'm also not finished with it so maybe that bit will resolve itself. Either way, this is a series I will continue to read and recommend as long as Kate continues to write them.

[FYI : The "Book Beginnings" this week isn't the first line or even the first paragraph ... but it is in the first chapter and needed to be done.]

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Friday 56 (share a blurb from the 56th page or 56% mark) is hosted at Freda's Voice 

& Book Beginnings (share the first few sentences) is at Rose City Reader