Genre: Mystery
Mass Market Paperback; Digital Book; Audiobook
ISBN #: 9781496723659
Kensington Publishing
285 Pages
$7.99; $6.89 Amazon
August 25, 2020
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Among the countless revelers at the town's much-anticipated Halloween parade, a woman dressed as Little Bo Peep is the only one making people scream bloody murder. In a scene straight out of a horror movie, the Knit and Nibblers find the nursery rhyme character dead with thick strands of yarn looped around her neck. Pamela and her best friend, Bettina, are set on pinning down who wanted the woman gone forever, but it'll take every trick they can muster to catch the culprit without becoming the next poor souls to join Little Bo Peep's dark, endless sleep...
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Pamela Paterson lives in Arborville, New Jersey and works for a magazine editing articles online. Her daughter attends college in Massachusetts, so it's only her and her two cats, Catrina and Ginger. She's attending a Halloween evening out complete with bonfire, and all her friends are dressed in costume. But when she and her friend Bettina Fraser hear a female screaming, they follow the voice and come across a dead woman. Another friend, Nell, assumes it's her neighbor Mary Lyon, because of the distinctive costume.
But when it's discovered that it's indeed a stranger, they start to wonder if Mary wasn't supposed to be the real victim. What can they do except warn Mary that someone might actually be after her. When she doesn't pay any attention to them, they worry but decide to leave it to the police. That is, until something else happens and now there are more worries than one...
I know; I said I wasn't going to read any more of these, but I figured since I'd already purchased them I may as well go ahead and finish. Actually, once you skip all the parts about eating and dinnerware, the book goes really fast, so there's that. Reading them together as I have, I got tired after book two about how Pamela uses her wedding china, and the color and shape of every dish every piece of food is served on (including the diner, where they use oval plates (does anyone really care?)
There is one thing that grossed me out though; Pamela mentions not once, but twice, how she's been wearing the same clothes all week. Eeeww. Does she have a washing machine? Other clothes? It's bad enough she doesn't care about her physical appearance (yet has time to comment on her friends' looks), but now not caring how wrinkled her clothes are getting? Seriously? Sorry, but I really don't go for bad hygiene, and not changing your clothes falls into that category, even if you work at home (I do, and trust me, I'll wear the same pair of jeans two days, but never more than that). Then there's the fact that she didn't want Richard, but now that he has someone else suddenly he's desirable? Yeah, how's that working for her? So Pamela is really going downhill in my eyes, in all areas.
I also didn't like the fact that she was describing college professors; the men are professional, as in wearing suits and ties, but the women all have grey hair, wear clothes that have no form and wear no makeup. What college is this?
Other than this, the plot was pretty decent, and even though I knew who the murderer was early on, it was still interesting to see how Pamela came to that conclusion. However, I really began to wonder how inept the police in this town were a couple of books ago, because there's never any police presence - except at the initial murder scene. We never see them question anyone; we get all our information secondhand through Bettina. They're never on top of the case and they're never anywhere at all where there might be trouble. What kind of police department is this?
So naturally, Pamela plays both detective and police department, getting the person to admit to her they committed the murder and then holding them until police arrive. You'd think the police would be embarrassed by this, but since they take all the credit, they never are. Well, you get my drift about this series, I hope..
This is my least favorite in the series, but since there's only one more to read, I will probably go ahead and do so, and see if the author has decided to allow Pamela to do laundry.
I received a copy of this book from the publisher and NetGalley but this in no way influenced my review.
More on Peggy Ehrhart's Books: https://www.fantasticfiction.com/e/peggy-ehrhart/
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