“As much as I loved reading about murder and mayhem, I had never kidded myself I’d make a good detective. The extent of my sleuthing ability was finding misfiled books and lost editions.”
Carter is quite possibly the coziest amateur sleuth I’ve ever read about, a complete cinnamon roll hero. He’s a librarian who prefers reading books and gardening to traveling, but this trip is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to meet one of his favorite authors. Unfortunately, he booked the trip years ago, before his (now ex) boyfriend cheated on him – and they’re both going on the trip, as well. At least Carter has a room to himself – until a last minute addition to the tour is set to room with him. Luckily, the new guy is hot, single and setting off Carter’s gaydar. If only he wasn’t setting off Carter’s something’s-not-right-o-meter, too!
The entire book happens in less than a week and is entirely from Carter’s POV, so the romance felt a bit rushed. While I definitely felt the chemistry between Carter and John, I was glad their relationship ended on a happily-for-now note rather than a true HEA, just because a week on a tour bus in Scotland didn’t seem like enough to build a relationship on. I’m honestly hoping that this will be the first in a series starting Carter and John, as I really enjoyed Carter’s POV and his approach to solving the mystery.
“I was thinking maybe we should…” Once again, she let it trail.
“We should what?”
“I don’t know. Investigate?”
I gawked at her. “What? Us? How? Why?”
She seemed startled at my response. “Why? Well, because.”
“Because why?”
“We’re all mystery buffs, after all. Who better?”
“Police. The local constabulary. The not local constabulary. Scotland Yard. The gamekeeper. The gatekeeper. The keymaster. I don’t know. Pretty much anyone other than us.”
As for the mystery piece, there’s lots of red herrings, so it was fun to pick through and figure out what was important and what wasn’t. If anything, I think I’d complain that it’s all a bit too much – there’s too many things going on and too many secondary characters. There are quite a few people – more than twenty – on the bus tour, and some are developed more than others, so it was easy to figure out who was important to the plot and who wasn’t. There’s an entire subplot with Carter’s ex and his new boyfriend that I felt wasn’t fully fleshed out – they seemed to be playing a much larger part earlier in the book and then it just fizzled out. I was pleased with the final resolution of the mystery, though, and especially liked the way Carter solved it.
Overall, I very much enjoyed the mixture of romance and mystery, and I’ll definitely be looking up more of the author’s books! Recommended if you like cozy mysteries with a side of librarian romance!
I received this book for free from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.