This one is only getting 3.5 stars, in spite of some very good writing and an excellent murder plot.
Deductions were made for some rather glaring editing errors, including the MC, Holly telling her staff to be on the lookout for a missing money clip on page 133 that isn't actually reported as missing until page 155.
I'm also deducting 1/2 star because Davis is doing the same thing with the romantic interests in this series that she did in her other series, which eventually drove me to stop reading that one. I can't call it a love triangle because it's not; it's not even romance. It's just glacially slow wishful thinking and pining for a childhood friend who's engaged to someone else, and an ex-boyfriend that keeps showing up for no apparent reason - he doesn't even try to get Holly back. Its weird.
Otherwise, I love this series. Wagtail is a town built for people who love their cats and dogs and everything caters to people and their pets. I want this town to exist and I want to live there - I don't care about the astronomically high body count! I want to take my cats to the pub! Davis knows how to write a tightly knit community and close friends, which makes it easier to ignore her penchant for also writing in at least one unrealistically antagonistic and stupid secondary character (in this case, Aunt Birdie).
The murder plot in this one surrounds a murder mystery weekend - but this one includes the whole town and involves a scavenger hunt. It's really quite brilliant and sounds like a great time. The plot was brilliantly executed and I was totally fooled the entire time.
I'm going to stick with this series for now - Wagtail as a town just holds too much appeal to me to let a not-a-love-triangle get on my nerves too much, but Davis could stand to step things up a bit in the romance department (and get rid of Ben).