kishab's reviews
289 reviews

This book is the epitome of cozy small town murder mystery. There's a mysterious aunt, a small town where everyone knows everything about everyone, a series of secrets and of course, a murder. There’s a lot of in depth description of the town, buildings, food and music that really add to the cozy atmosphere. The main character was a little irritating to me and a lot of her choices were weird. Someone said something suspicious to her, she changes the subject and doesn’t explore it further but also takes it upon herself to investigate other suspects. She gets mysterious threatening phone calls but doesn’t report them. I guess it lends to the progression of the story but it felt a little jarring that her choices were a bit all over the place. At one point I thought there was supposed to be a love triangle but it didn't go further than a little flirting and a weird one sided dislike that didn't go anywhere. The murder and mysteries took a back seat to the setting and atmosphere, which I didn't mind, but it did make the book feel like it was dragging a bit. At the end the mystery portion was a bit predictable, and it seemed like a lot of things were brought up but not explored further. I feel like the author is introducing characters in order to continue a series and not the story taking place in this book. Overall I still had a fun time reading (and listening to the audiobook - the narrator is great) and I would be interested in reading more by this author.

 

Thanks to NetGalley, St. Martins Press and P.J Nelson for this e-ARC that I chose to read and review

I really liked the concept and the world building that took place in this novel, there’s a lot of political strife that is really well done. You can also really tell that the authors wrote this with a lot of love and respect for the marital arts, the training and fight scenes are so well thought out and immersive. The whole book reads almost like a prequel, there a lot of build up and hints for the next book. It was almost too much though in that there wasn't much that actually was resolved in the books. A lot of the characters felt kind of surface level and not many of the relationships that were brought up were explored. Regardless, I got invested in the story pretty quickly once it got going and I'm interested to see what will happen in the next installment

 

Thanks to St. Martins Press, NetGalley, Fonda Lee and Shannon Lee for this e-ARC that I chose to read and review