Murder in Cherry Hills (Cozy Cat Caper Mystery, #1)

by Paige Sleuth

[Mystereity Reviews]

3 1/2 stars

Cute short story, and a good first in a new series. Murder in Cherry Hills has Kat Harper newly returned to her hometown when she finds her neighbor's cat, Matilda, on her doorstep and her neighbor murdered in her apartment. Can Kat catch a killer?

I enjoyed the characters, I look forward to seeing them gain dimension as the series goes on, as well as developing Kat's back story. Great plot, too although it wasn't so much solved as narrated.

Because the story was so short, only 60 or so pages, you don't get a lot of detail needed to set up a new story. Because of this, you don't "meet" the victim and the reader has to rely on the MC to "tell" the reader about past events, motivations, etc, so it becomes less a story and more of a narrative. Which may work in fiction, but it's not very effective in mysteries.

Also, I thought Matilda the cat would have more substance in the story. From the description, I thought the cat would find some way to tell Kat what she'd seen. But no, not really. The cat ended up being a part of the background except for one scene.

So, overall, a promising start to a new series but not without limitations due to story length. A few more pages and this would be a solid book.