Pressed to Death: A Perfectly Proper Paranormal Museum Mystery (Perfectly Proper Paranormal Museum Mystery, #2)

by Kirsten Weiss

• ISBN10: 073875031X
• ISBN13: 9780738750316
• Publish Date: 8 March 2017
• Publish Status: Out of Print
• Out of Print: 2 July 2021
• Publish Country: US
• Imprint: Midnight Ink
• Format: Paperback
• Pages: 336
• Language: English

Reviews

[Eve1972]

I always love the covers on these cozy mystery books. This one is a very good representation of the story within. It's eye-catching and interesting. The composition is spot on. It has interesting typography and makes great use of graphics.

I enjoyed this one. It was quirky and well-written. It had a nice pace to it. It was filled with twist and turns. It had a bunch of interesting side characters, and it kept me guessing right up until the end.

That said, what I could have done without was the romance aspect. One because romances rarely work for me in these type of books. They are always inevitably underdeveloped or treated as an afterthought. And that was the case here. Two, this romance was depressing and included one of the biggest cliches you'll find in romance books. I ended up thinking Mason was a douche and although I was glad Maddie ended things I finished this book feeling bummed out, and that took away from my enjoyment of the story as a whole.

Had the romance aspect been simpler without all the cliched drama or had it been left out altogether this book would have gotten a higher rating.

[Mystereity Reviews]

See my full review (and more!) at Mystereity Reviews

Maddie has just bought a haunted grape press for her Paranormal Museum when she's accused of stealing it by a vintner that Maddie later finds dead. Coerced into investigating by her mother, Maddie puts catching a killer at the top of her to-do list, along with staging a room at a Halloween haunted house and hosting a Death Cafe at the Paranormal Museum.

I liked this, but I was a little disappointed. At the heart of this book is a good premise and an intriguing plot. The current day murders had a lot of twists and turns, and the story behind the haunted grape press (and everyone's reaction to it) was entertaining. I loved Maddie's room at the Haunted House (actually, I would've loved to see the whole thing!) and the descriptions of the custom Oujia boards she sells made me want to go out and buy one. As for Adele's new descriptions of her teas, I thought they were colorful and a bit corny, but pornographic? Nope. Harper needs to get out more.

Unfortunately, the murders weren't the focus of the book; the plots were largely buried under the weight of Maddie's love life, the town placing bets on whether Maddie will solve the crime, the Ladies Aid anarchy, the Death Cafe, and the terrifically annoying Det. Hammer whose purpose seems only to be a distraction and is a negative stereotype that makes police look bad (as if they need any more of that.)

Overall, this is a very cute and enjoyable series (and I still love the idea of a paranormal museum!) and this book was a good read but it would've been so much better if the focus was more on the mystery and less on all the other silliness.

Thank you to Midnight Ink and Netgalley, who provided an advanced copy in return for an honest review.