Addressed to Kill (A Postmistress Mystery #3)

Author:  Jean Flowers
Genre:  Mystery

Mass Market Paperback; Digital Book
ISBN:  9780425279120
Berkley Publishing
304 Pages
$7.99; $7.99 Amazon
July 25, 2017

✮✮

Love is in the air for postmaster Cassie Miller and the residents of North Ashcot, Massachusetts.  Valentine's Day is right around the corner, and the town is gearing up for a special dinner dance at the senior center.  Since the local musical group performing at the dance has been displaced from their regular practice location, Cassie is all too happy to host them during off-hours at the post office.

But not everything is coming up roses.  When one of the musicians, Dennis Somerville, is found shot in his home, rumors swirl over who might have wanted him dead.  Cassie must determine if there is a link between a string of recent break-ins and Dennis's murder before another victim winds up with more than a broken heart.

✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽

As the third book in the Postmistress series, I really wanted to like it better than the first two.  But there are so many things wrong with this book, beginning with buildings changing locations and growing larger.  That's right - growing larger.  In the last book, the drawings showed the post office, then buildings 1201 Main and 1203 Main on the corner facing the bank.  In this book, it's 1203 Main, 1201 Main, and a much larger post office (now transposed to the corner and facing the bank) - attached to a community center that didn't exist before.  Maybe others don't pay attention to details, but I do.  And these details most certainly weren't in the previous book.  You can't just change locations of buildings and make them larger on a whim.  Not to mention I've never heard of a post office having a community center.  That's just odd.

Secondly, supposedly there are three thousand people in the town of North Ashcot, but only one postal employee.  They don't deliver mail, and we're supposed to believe that everyone goes to the post office to get it.  Even if half are children, that's a lot of post boxes they'd need.  This post office must be the biggest in the country to accommodate that many.  Plus, can you imagine the lines of people picking up/mailing packages at Christmas?  In fact, she wouldn't have time to investigate murders.  She'd spend all her time sorting mail and putting it in the boxes.  I check my mail every day, as do most people.  I thought this was a town of about 100 people up until now.  Now I understand some towns don't do home delivery - but with this many people you'd have to have more than one person and keep the post office open a lot longer to accommodate those that work during the day, not to mention disabled people would need their mail delivered.  Also, when does she sort the mail?  Is it done by elves in the middle of the night?  Because Cassie never mentions sorting, yet with all these people, that would take a lot of time.  So, a town this size, with everyone coming into the post office every day to get their mail would take up an awful lot of time - and again, need more than ONE employee to do so.

When a professor is murdered Cassie blames herself because he wanted her to investigate threatening letters (which he should have taken to the police department if he thought his life was threatened) so nosy Cassie needs to investigate - again.  While Cassie's in the perfect job for her, since she thinks post offices are fascinating, they're not.  I really tried to like it, but sorry, I am so done with this series.

https://www.amazon.com/Addressed-Kill-Postmistress-Mystery-Flowers/dp/042527912X/

Goodreads:  https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2214323005

More on Jean Flowers's Books:  https://www.fantasticfiction.com/f/jean-flowers/