A New Lease on Death: A Mystery

by Olivia Blacke

Ruby Young's new Boston apartment comes with all the usual perks. Windows facing the brick wall of the next-door building. Heat that barely works. A malfunctioning buzzer. Noisy neighbours. A dead body on the sidewalk outside. And of course, a ghost.

Since Cordelia Graves died in her apartment a few months ago, she's kept up her residency, despite being bored out of her (non-tangible) skull and frustrated by her new roommate. When her across-the-hall neighbour, Jake Macintyre, is shot and killed in an apparent mugging gone wrong outside their building, Cordelia is convinced there’s more to it and is determined to bring his killer to justice.

Unfortunately, Cordelia, being dead herself, can't solve the mystery alone. She has to enlist the help of the obnoxiously perky, living tenant of her apartment. Ruby is twenty, annoying, and has never met a houseplant she couldn't kill. But she also can do everything Cordelia can't, from interviewing suspects to researching Jake on the library computers that go up in a puff of smoke if Cordelia gets too close. As the roommates form an unlikely friendship and get closer to the truth about Jake's death, they also start to uncover other dangerous secrets.

• ISBN10: 1250336678
• ISBN13: 9781250336675
• Publish Date: 16 December 2024 (first published 29 October 2024)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Imprint: Minotaur Books,US
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 336
• Language: English
• URL: http://melia.co.uk/page/detail/?k=9781250336675

Reviews

[annieb123]

Originally posted on my blog Nonstop Reader.

A New Lease on Death is the first book in a new cozy paranormal series by Olivia Blacke. Released 29th Oct 2024 by by Macmillan on their Minotaur imprint, it's 336 pages and is available in hardcover, audio, and ebook formats. It's worth noting that the ebook format has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links throughout. 

This is a light cozy with some darker moments. There are themes of substance abuse, alcoholism, lots of mentions of suicide, infidelity (long term), financial irregularity, domestic violence, and some not-quite-cozy descriptions of violence and murder. 

It -is- a cozy, however, with a very strong central paranormal theme (one of the main characters is a ghost). It's sort of a "buddy caper" with a duo of women, one of whom is living challenged. The writing is light and easy to read, and the character driven action flows well. The dialogue isn't always very well polished and there were a few issues with pacing throughout. It mostly felt like a setup for future series books, and whilst that isn't a deal-breaker, it did lead to some frustration with the here-and-now of the mystery in *this* volume on which the two main characters are supposed to be concentrating. 

The denouement and resolution felt a bit deux-ex-machina and were pulled out of nowhere. Again, not a deal breaker, but not ideal. 

It's warm and humorous and a definite comfort read. It would make a good choice for a weekend buddy read for fans of paranormal cozies. There is one *glaring* plot problem with the world building which will likely annoy readers who notice it, but otherwise a fun and undemanding read. Some of the "features" of ghost-Cordelia's existence were a bit lazy (she can do anything she *believes* she can do), but again, probably ok inside the parameters of the genre. 

Three and a half stars. It will be interesting to see this series develop. 

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.