And Then They Were Doomed (A Little Library Mystery #4)

And Then They Were Doomed is the 4th Little Library mystery by Elizabeth Kane Buzzelli. Released 13th Aug by Crooked Lane, it's 323 pages and available in hardcover and ebook formats.

This is a difficult book to categorize and review. It's too dark and realistic to be a cozy mystery, has too little dramatic tension to be a thriller, and too frivolous to be a modern gritty mystery. The disparate plot threads don't seem to belong to the same book. The characters are generally annoying and I was yanked out of my suspension of disbelief literally every page by the weird (almost surreal) dialogue. The book is written in 3rd person but there's almost no insight or explanation behind the characters' motivations.

I enjoyed the Agatha Christie pastiche. For readers who have not yet read And Then There Were None, or Murder on the Orient Express, and intend to do so sometime, this book might not be a good fit because it spoils both books. This one can presumably be read as a standalone, the weird semi-surreal randomness of this book isn't due to lack of backstory, it's just really strange and random. Zoe Zola is a little person, and apparently, despite it never being mentioned in the earlier books, she's a Christie authority and is writing a biography. She has an extremely dysfunctional family who shunned her mother for being pregnant and producing a little person and have apparently kept up with Zoe and her late mother's whereabouts carefully enough over the years to continue harassing them by randomly sending black bordered death announcements. (Yes, really).

When Zoe gets an invitation to participate in a webinar on Agatha Christie, she agrees, despite the webinar location being in a remote B-horror-film hunting lodge in the middle of nowhere, and despite the black bordered invitation being ostensibly sent by one of her dangerously crazy relatives. (Yes, really). The setup, dialogue, and story honestly become less believable from there.

I can't say it was a pleasant read. This is the second book in the series for me and as of this moment, I'm not tempted to continue. In an aside, there is a very brief random mention of the whole little library concept in chapter 5, but that's it. It has no relevance to the plot at all.

Two and a half stars, rounded up for the Christie references. Very odd book.

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