Peaches and Schemes (A Georgia B&B Mystery #3)

Author:    Anna Gerard

Genre:     Mystery

Hardcover; Digital Book

ISBN #:    9781643855844

Crooked Lane Books

304 Pages

$22.99; $13.99 Amazon

May 11, 2021

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Nina Fleet might be new to the innkeeping business, but she's savvy enough to know that Cymbeline's tourists aren't enough to keep her fledgling bed and breakfast going.  And so, Nina decides to tap into the destination wedding market by taking a booth at the Veils and Vanities Bridal Expo.  The twice-yearly event is sponsored by the town's two wedding pros: Virgie Hamilton, the sixty-something owner of Virgie's Formals, and Roxanna Quarry, a Gen X event planner and Nina's new friend.  But everything goes wrong during the expo's fashion show, when Roxana comes tumbling out of an oversized prop wedding cake, strangled to death by her own scarf.

Virgie is arrested for the crime, thanks to Nina's statement to the police about having overheard the woman accusing her partner of embezzlement.  Meanwhile, the situation grows tense with her sometimes nemesis and current tenant, the dashing out-of-work actor Harry Westcott.  Harry is concentrating on plugging his most recent side hustle...but he's not too busy to break the news to Nina that her ex-husband is engaged to be married again.

Certain that Virgie's only offense is a bad temper, Nina decides to do her own investigating.  First, however, she and Harry retrieve Roxanna's now ownerless dog, planning to foster him until a new home can be found.  But local gossip soon convinces Nina that others beside Virgie might have had a reason to murder Roxanna.  As Nina gets close to the truth, she's putting her own life at danger.  And when Virgie vanishes after being bailed out of jail by an unknown benefactor, Nina fears that if she can't find the dress shop owner in time, tying the knot will take on a whole new meaning for them both.

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Nina Fleet owns a Georgia B&B in the small town of Cymbelline.  Her constant tenant is Harry Westcott, an out-of-work actor whom she's allowed to live for free in the tower room, where he spent summers as a child when the large Queen Anne Victorian belonged to his late aunt.  While her business is thriving, she figures it could always use help, and signs up to host a booth at the bridal expo, offering her B&B as a wedding destination where couples could be married in her generous garden.  While there, she hears two contentious arguments: one between Virgie and a local florist, with whom she apparently has a past, and another between Virgie and her friend Roxanna Quarry, who owns an event planning business.

But when there is a gown finale, when the large cake is opened, Roxanna tumbles out, apparently strangled by the colorful scarf she was wearing.  Now Virgie is the main suspect in the murder, and Nina refuses to believe she's guilty.  What's worse, after she and Harry pick up Gustopher, Roxanna's orphaned dog, Nina goes to Roxanna's home the next day to return an ominous item she accidentally picked up.  But when she finds the home trashed, she calls the police and now she's smack in the middle of the investigation whether she wants it or not.

Then she learns that her ex-husband is getting married again, to a woman half his age.  While she doesn't love Cam anymore, the fact still sends her reeling, and to top it off, Harry discloses a long-held secret that doesn't help.  Now Nina needs to find a murderer among a roomful of suspects, and put her own feelings on hold.  Easy to say, but doing might be harder when things are beginning to change...

This is the third book in the series and I have to say that so far it happens to be my favorite.  I enjoyed the last one quite a bit, but this book takes us a little bit more into the lives of Nina and Harry, and it explains some things about him; I've always felt that Harry is aloof, and this book gives us a hint as to his past.

When we look for the murderer, we learn more about Roxanna, and it's not nice.  The persona that she showed Nina isn't the same persona she showed other people, and even though Nina finds these things out, she still wants justice for her friend.

When we finally discover the murderer and the reason for the killing, it's believable and the climax is definitely worth waiting for.  Then, life for Nina can go back to normal, or maybe it won't...a delightful read, and I eagerly look forward to the next in the series.  Recommended.

https://www.amazon.com/Peaches-Schemes-Georgia-Anna-Gerard/dp/1643855840/ref

Goodreads:    https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3927750009

More on Anna Gerard's Books:    https://www.fantasticfiction.com/g/anna-gerard/

Peachy Scream (A Georgia B&B Mystery #2)

Author:  Anna Gerard
Genre:   Mystery

Hardcover; [Audio CD]; Digital Book
ISBN #:  9781643853062; [9781662007354]
Crooked Lane Books; [Dreamscape Media]
$26.99; [$19.99]; $12.99 Amazon
July 7, 2020

⭐⭐⭐⭐

It's nothing short of inevitable that Cymbeline, GA, hosts an annual Shakespeare festival.  But stage-struck Nina Fleet is about to learn that putting on an amateur theatrical production can be murder.  Nina's anticipating showbiz glamour and glitz when a community Shakespearean troupe arrives for a two-week stay at her B&B.  But the lights dim when she learns the company's director is her nemesis, struggling actor Harry Westcott -- who still claims to be the rightful heir to Nina's elegant Queen Anne home.

Meanwhile, the troupe members are not content to leave the drama upon the stage.  Accusations of infidelity and financial malfeasance make a shambles of rehearsals.  And then, two days into the troupe's stay, the lead actor is found dead in Nina's formal Shakespeare garden.  Natural causes...or murder most foul?

Nina uncovers evidence that something is indeed rotten in the town of Cymbeline.  Too bad Harry is the only one who believes that she's not going completely off script.  And exposing the truth isn't easy when the remaining troupe members say the show must go on...particularly when all of them seemingly had a motive for wanting their fellow actor to permanently exit stage right.  Determined to keep the killer from making a curtain call, Nina and her trusty Australian Shepherd, Matilda, join forces with Harry to sleuth out the murder plot.  Will they succeed before somome else shuffles off this mortal coil?

✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽

Nina Fleet owns a B&B in Cymbeline, Georgia.  She's expecting a Shakespearean troupe to be staying at her home, since they will be putting on Hamlet during the Shakespeare festival in town.  What she's not expecting is that the troupe is headed by her foe Harry Westcott, an actor who insists that her home really belongs to him.  She's not looking forward to dealing with him again, but unless she wants to ruin the festival, there's no way to turn him out.

Once everyone is settled in her home, she meets the rest of the troupe and soon realizes that Len Marsh, who is playing the lead, is also a bully toward the rest of the players.  But when Len is found dead in her Shakespeare garden, everyone thinks it was natural causes.  Everyone, except Nina.  And when one of the other actors gets ill becomes ill, she wonders if that person isn't the target of a murderer, too.  Once again enlisting Harry to help - once he believes her - Nina knows she has a murderer under her roof, and intends to find out who it is and who the intended next victim might be...

Nina is convinced that Len was murdered, but she obviously doesn't know who the killer is, and when she starts looking, she learns that every member of the troupe might have had reason enough to want him dead.  So in between a little sleuthing on her own, she finally enlists Harry, who eventually agrees to help her.  In this effort, Nina is conscripted to also work as an actor in the play, although she doesn't have any lines; presumably to keep an eye on the actors during the play and make sure no one harms anyone else.

This is the second book in the series and I have to say that it's quite an improvement over the first.  I really didn't like Harry in the first book, but in this one he's a lot more human in the fact that he's not threatening to take Nina's home every two seconds.  They actually become friends in this book, and I find that attractive and it made the book more enjoyable to read.

While the mystery is done well, shortly after Len was murdered I discovered who the murderer was and while the rest of the plot followed that, I can only say that I read a lot of mysteries, so I usually have it figured out immediately anyway.  But I did like the Shakespeare aspect, and the fact that it was a troupe of actors involved, and that with the Hamlet background it all fell into place.  It made for a good mystery with interesting characters, and that's what mysteries are supposed to do.  All in all, this was an entertaining book and I will read the next in the series.

https://www.amazon.com/Peachy-Scream-Georgia-Anna-Gerard/dp/1643853066/ref

Goodreads:  https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3323584908

More on Anna Gerard's Books:  https://www.fantasticfiction.com/g/anna-gerard/

Peach Clobbered (A Georgia B&B Mystery #1)

Author:  Anna Gerard
Genre:   Mystery

Hardcover; Digital Book
ISBN #:  9781643850061
Crooked Lane Books
$17.70; $12.99 Amazon
July 9, 2019

⭐⭐

Nina Fleet's life ought to be sweet as a Georgia peach.  Awarded a tidy sum in her divorce, Nina retired at 41 to a historic Queen Anne house in quaint Cymbeline, GA.  But Nina's barely settled into her new B&B-to-be when a penguin shows up on her porch.  Or, at least, a man wearing a penguin suit.

Harry Westcott is making ends meet as an ice cream shop's mascot and has a letter from his great-aunt, pledging to leave him the house.  Too bad that's not what her will says.  Meanwhile, the Sisters of Perpetual Poverty have lost their lease.  Real estate developer Gregory Bainbridge intends to turn the convent into a golfing community, so Cymbeline's mayor persuades Nina to take in the elderly nuns.  And then Nina finds the "penguin" again, this time lying in an alley with a kitchen knife in his chest.

A peek under the beak tells Nina it's not Harry inside the costume, but Bainbridge.  What was he doing in Harry's penguin suit?  Was the developer really the intended victim, or did the culprit mean to kill Harry?  Whoever is out to stop Harry from contesting the sale of his great-aunt's house may also be after Nina, so she teams up with him to cage the killer before someone clips her wings.

✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽

Nina Fleet is a 41-year-old divorceé who bought an old Victorian home just outside Atlanta, Georgia in small-town Cymbeline.  She'd like to turn it into a B&B, but the mayor won't let her.  One day she receives a knock on her door and answers it, seeing a six-foot-tall penguin standing there.  Well, actually it's a man in a penguin suit, and he eventually tells her she's living in his house and demands she give it back.  He has a letter from his great-aunt, the former owner, that states an intent to leave the house to him in her will, but she died before she could change it.

Nina refuses to give the home back, and Harry Westcott, an out-of-work actor, threatens to take her to court.  Not a good start.  Later the mayor shows up with a bus full of nuns and tells her she'll fast-track her request to open the B&B if she takes in a group of nuns who have been evicted from their convent.  Faced with not much of a choice, she agrees.

She finds out that Gregory Bainbridge, a developer, has evicted the nuns so that he can build homes on their land.  When she starts talking to people, it's apparent that everyone hates Bainbridge.  But it's even more apparent when she's called to help someone who's been stabbed in the chest - and seeing the penguin suit, she thinks it's Harry.  But it's Bainbridge, and now she has an entire stable of suspects - namely almost everyone in town.

But then Harry tells her that he was the intended victim, and he has a stalker that's trying to kill him.  But the situation gets out of control when Nina realizes that there's more at stake than a stalker, and she needs his help to find a killer...

I guess I was expecting more from this book than I received.  Firstly, the title is disappointing.  You'd think Peach Clobbered would mean something like someone dying by having a truckload of peaches fall on them.  In fact, the only peaches mentioned in the book is peach cobbler, and trust me, no one dies from eating it.  (A better title would have been Death of a Penguin).  Anyway...

I got tired of her telling everyone her name was Nine-ah, not Neen-ah.  So why didn't her parents name her Nyna?  Then she wouldn't have to keep correcting anyone.  It got annoying after awhile.  I also thought it was pretty stupid to open a B&B if you can't cook.  Wouldn't catering in breakfast eat into your profits?  Plus, eating quiche every day of the week?  Half the fun is the different choices for breakfast each day.  Cereal?  Seriously?  When no children were staying there?  Who goes to a B&B and eats cereal?  Coffee and tea but not milk nor juice?  My suggestion is that she learns to cook so she can actually make money, not spend it.  Details, people.

BELOW IS A SPOILER SO PLEASE DO NOT READ ANY FARTHER UNLESS YOU WANT TO KNOW:

But here's the biggie:  While Harry may not like the fact Nina has his great-aunt's house, she bought it legally and holds the deed.  He can't sue her for that.  He can't demand she give the house to him.  He has a letter, not a writ of execution that states the house belongs to him.  He has a letter that states she's going to it, but no will stating the fact; and, the opposing attorney could claim that perhaps she changed her mind and decided not to give him the house after all.  Poor Harry doesn't have much of a claim after all.

Now, if he were to sue anyone, he could sue his father - the legal executor of the will.  If his father knew about the letter and sold the house out from under him, then he might have a case.  But a letter saying, "yes, you can have it" probably wouldn't hold up in the long run.  It would, of course, depend upon who the judge was; but I can't see basing an entire series around an improbability - and the story line will get old fast with Nina and Harry 'helping' each other solve cases and then him threatening to take her house every chance he got.  Why doesn't he get a real job and buy a house instead of expecting someone to just give it to him for free? 

No, thanks.  Harry is a taker - he's not a likable person; he wants things given to him but isn't willing to do anything just because it's the right thing to do.  He's not willing to see that she bought the house fair and square; he wants her to give it to him merely because he thinks he deserves it.  I saw nowhere where he told her he spoke with either his father or the attorney who wrote the will before confronting Nina.  He derides her and even blackmails her if she doesn't do what he wants.  Harry's the worst society has to offer and I'd be happy never to see or hear from him again.

Sorry, but as long as there's a chance Harry might be in this series again, I think I'll skip this one.

https://www.amazon.com/Peach-Clobbered-Georgia-Anna-Gerard/dp/1643850067/ref

Goodreads:  https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2897262055

More on Anna Gerard's Books:  https://www.fantasticfiction.com/g/anna-gerard/