annieb123's Review of A Midsummer Night's Scheme (A Bookbinding Mystery, #2)

by Harper Kincaid

Perfect for fans of Jenn McKinlay and Kate Carlisle, Harper Kincaid's second installment in the Bookbinding mysteries is sure to charm.
All the world's a stage, but it may be curtains for bookbinder Quinn Victoria Caine if she can't bring the lights down on an actor's killer .

Chad Hurt is Vienna, Virginia's Local Boy Made Good. Back in the day, Chad was mostly known for breaking female hearts, but now he's a big-time Broadway actor. Now, he's back in Vienna, onstage on the Town Green, to announce the glitzy new theater he's about to build in town. But after the announcement, as he gets in his car to leave, he's killed by a sackful of snakes someone's stashed in the back seat.

Chad's only mourner is his blue Burmese kitten, Cindy Clawford. She wanders into the quaint Prose & Scones bookshop and strikes up a friendship with the resident German shepherd, Ruff Barker Ginsburg. So RBG's dog-mom, bookbinder Quinn Victoria Caine, feels compelled to search for Chad's killer.

Blood and revenge are hammering in someone's head, but whose? Is the culprit one of the scores of women done wrong? Could it be Quinn's fireman brother, Bash, who was Chad's main competitor for town Lothario? When Bash becomes a target--black widow spiders tucked into his clothes--Quinn and RBG (with Cindy riding on his back) set aside their Hamlet-esque indecision and spring into action. But the only evidence is a scrap of paper bearing a vengeful Shakespeare quote. Can Quinn track down the one who seeks a pound of flesh, or will she face the sleep of death?

Originally posted on my blog Nonstop Reader.

A Midsummer Night's Scheme is the second Bookbinding cozy by Harper Kincaid. Released 21st March 2023 by Crooked Lane, it's 288 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 and references throughout. I've really become enamored of ebooks with interactive formats lately.

This is a fun, very light, bookish shopfront cozy full of pets, over the top (borderline silly) plot developments, and lots of puns. The violence happens off-scene and the language is very clean, not even PG level (one "damned" and a clean humorous punnish pin one of the characters wears). The book is a standalone, but there are definitely some overarching plot details which are carried over into the next book(s).

Readers will need to bring a stout suspension of disbelief to the read since many of the situations and motives are fairly contrived. The author has included a number of intriguing southern recipes at the back of the book as a bonus (including fried pickles and liver & onions).

Three and a half stars. Well worth a look for fans of light bookish cozies such as Sue Minix, Ellery Adams, and Ellie Alexander.

Disclosure: I received a copy of this book at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.

Reading updates

30 April, 2023: Started reading

30 April, 2023: Finished reading

30 April, 2023: Reviewed