Protected: Week/Weekend Recap
November 14, 2022
Book Review | The Last Party by Clare Mackintosh
November 16, 2022
Murder is Binding (A Booktown Mystery #1) by Lorna Barrett
★★★☆☆
288 pages
Published: April 1, 2008 by
Berkley Prime Crime
The streets of Stoneham, New Hampshire, are lined with bookstores…and paved with murder.
When she moved to Stoneham, city slicker Tricia Miles met nothing but friendly faces. And when she opened her mystery bookstore, she met friendly competition. But when she finds Doris Gleason dead in her own cookbook store, killed by a carving knife, the atmosphere seems more cutthroat than cordial. Someone wanted to get their hands on the rare cookbook that Doris had recently purchased-and the locals think that someone is Tricia. To clear her name, Tricia will have to take a page out of one of her own mysteries-and hunt down someone who isn’t killing by the book.
Main Characters
- Tricia – main character; owner of the bookstore Haven’t Got a Clue that focuses in mysteries; recently divorced
- Ginny – Tricia’s assistant and friend at the bookstore
- Mr. Everett – helper at the book store after being a regular patron
- Angelica – Tricia’s sister; she has had 4 marraiges and recently is coming out of her last one. Her ex left her. She has moved to Stoneham to be closer to her sister – they have not been close over the years
- Miss Marple – Tricia’s cat
- Sheriff Wendy Adams – adamant that Tricia is the murderer
- Doris Gleason – owner of The Cookery, the bookstore next to Tricia’s
- Deidre Gleason – Doris’s identical twin sister that no one knew about
- Bob Kelly – owner of the bookstores, real estate entrepreneur
- Mike Harris – running for election, his campaign is being run out or a tiny building across from Tricia’s; she goes on one date with him. He is an insurance agent in town
- Grace – Mike’s mother that has been put in a home for dementia
- Russ – reporter, writes a tough article about Tricia being the town jinx
- Roger Livingston – Tricia’s lawyer at the end of the book
- Winnie – bought stuff at estate sales and then sold to the book stores; she dies in a car accident at the beginning
My Review
This is a cute, first book in a cozy mystery series – perfect for the wintery weather that we have been having in Minnesota. The plot was a little iffy, but entertaining. It was pretty easy to guess who did it towards the middle – but I don’t read these kinds of books to be surprised. Tricia moves to a small town in New Hampshire to open up a mystery book store after going through a divorce. The town has been revitalized by a series of book stores that bring tourist into the town. Her sister comes to town, unwanted, and they stumble upon a fire at the store next door and the owner (who no on around town really liked) dead inside. Tricia becomes the number one suspect.
I think the dynamic between Tricia and her sister Angelica is interesting – this gave the book a little depth as they worked through their history. I loved Mr. Everett’s character and hope he gets to shine in future books in this series. While I won’t be rushing to get the second book in this series – I will definitely put it on my TBR pile!
Spoilers
*SPOILERS – Do NOT expand this section unless you want to know the spoilers!*
The person killed in the Cuttery was not Doris, it was her twin sister Deidre. Doris killed her to profit off her death – her sister was going to die of pancreatic cancer so she teamed up with Mike Harris to work out insurance benefits for Doris to kill Deidre and then swap places. Mike was poisoning his mom with hot cocoa to create a drug reaction that mimicked dementia so that he could put her in a home and sell of her things. His mom was the owner of the expensive book that was sold to Doris. Doris and Mike kidnap Tricia and Angelia. They crash into water, Mike dies. Tricia’s name is finally cleared but the sheriff hates her (she had a thing for Mike). Angelica announces at the end that she has bought the Cuttery and is moving to Stoneham permanently.