When the Crow's Away is the second book in the Evenfall Witches paranormal cozy series by Auralee Wallace. Released 5th April 2022 by Penguin Random House on their Berkley imprint, it's 304 pages and is available in mass market paperback, audio, and ebook formats. It's worth noting that the ebook format has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links throughout. I've really become enamored of ebooks with interactive formats, it makes it so easy to find info with the search function if needed.
I tend to fall on the slightly retro golden age british country house mystery side of the cozy subgenre. I -tend- to not seek out paranormal mysteries (although I do love ones with animals, go figure). This was a delightful surprise. I also hadn't read the first book in the series before reading this one because of tight review deadlines. The author is quite adept at providing necessary backstory without it feeling pedantic or info-dumping on unsuspecting readers. It worked well as a standalone and the climax, denouement, and resolution were satisfying and believable within the framework of the story.
It's a small town cozy and full of the sort of quirky eccentricity for which the genre is well known. Some of the punny character names are worthy of a light eye-roll, the role of first murder victim's ghost is histrionically played by Mortimer Sweete, the candy shop man, but all in all I didn't find myself yanked out of my suspension of disbelief very often.The language is squeaky clean (G-rated) and the violence happens off-page.
It's written in first person PoV and I was impressed with the author's ability to keep it readable and fresh and not like a laundry list of "I thought...", "I did this... and then that". It's not an easy exercise and she makes good use of the first person to drive the action in the story. I will say that the actual mystery/puzzle is quite well constructed and well above the average for the genre.
Four and a half stars. For real lovers of the paranormal cozy genre, this will be a 5 star read. Highly recommended.
Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.
No comments:
Post a Comment