Author: Thea Cambert
Genre: Mystery
Paperback; Digital Book
ISBN #: 9798670892001
Independently Published
166 Pages
$7.99; $3.99 Amazon
July 29, 2020
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Nothing puts a damper on the holiday spirit...
Quite like a murder.
It's holiday festival time in picturesque Blue Valley, Tennessee, which means there'll be plenty of fun, and an onslaught of tourists coming to town. This year, Paper Owl owner, and amateur sleuth, Alice Maguire, is helping out with organizing the Hometown Holidays Festival.
The festival fearures a week chock full of activities, beginning with the Bowl Full of Jelly 5k Fun Run, and leading into the Mistletoe Market, the Winter Wonderland, and the annual Tinsel Theater's production of A Christmas Carol.
Main Street is decorated to the nines, and the rooftop garden that Alice shares with her fellow sleuthers is cozier than every, with the addition of Owen's new fire ring. Franny will be whipping up plenty of hot chocolate, and Alice's budding romance with Luke Evans is going smoothly.
Life is good in the quaint little town, and it's shaping up to be a perfectly wonderful holiday, but when a body is discovered at the 5K, it'll be up to Alice, Owen, and Franny to make sure that Blue Valley's Hometown Holidays Festival gets back on track -- and that means they'll have to catch a murderer.
Will they catch the killer and save the festival?
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Alice Maguire and her friends are preparing things for the Hometown Holidays Festival in small town Blue Valley, Tennessee. There's a new 5K race that's going to take place, and the person who is going to direct their own version of Dickens' A Christmas Carol, Ash, is ready and raring to go. But not everyone is happy about his changes. A local named Chester is angry because his Ebenezer Scrooge has been scratched entirely from the show, and it's been changed to a modern version about an alcoholic. But Ash seems to have made other enemies in town, and Alice is about to find out who they are when Ash's body is found during the race.
Now with Chester being suspected of murdering the man, she knows he couldn't have done it, but who did? With her friends Franny and Owen on board, they want to investigate and find out who had the biggest motive to get rid of the demanding director...
This is the second book in the series, and I enjoyed it quite as much as the first. This isn't high art, nor is it supposed to be. It's a book to be read and enjoyed, and I did just that. It takes place at the Christmas holiday, and even though we are well past the season, nothing says we can't visit it now and then and I am glad I did.
I enjoy the banter between the characters, and the fact that the romances aren't getting in the way of the murder mystery. While it was fairly easy to decipher who the guilty party was (I read a lot of mysteries, as I've stated often enough) it was still fun to read the story and watch how Alice came to the same conclusion.
Her relationships with her friends is warming, and I like the fact that her brother Ben doesn't chide her for getting involved, because, after all, Alice doesn't knowingly walk into situations she shouldn't. It's a story that can be read in a couple of hours, and it's relaxing and enjoyable.
When the ending comes and the murderer is revealed, it's not so much a surprise as satisfying for the conclusion, and the motive for the murder is, of course, one that is as old as time itself. After all, there are only so many reasons for murder, right? But I think the writing is very good, and the author has given a story that will entertain, which is the reason for books anyway. Recommended.
More on Thea Cambert's Books: https://www.fantasticfiction.com/c/thea-cambert/
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