Dead and Gondola is the first book in a new shopfront bookstore cozy series by Ann Claire. Released 1st Nov 2022 by Penguin Random House on their Ballantine imprint, it's 336 pages and is available in 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. I've really become enamored of ebooks with interactive formats lately.
This is a well written and engaging bookish cozy mystery set in ski country in Colorado. The amateur protagonists, sisters whose name is Christie, who own and manage a bookstore, are intelligent and believably rendered. The clues and mystery are fair play, and are self contained in this volume, so no cliffhangers or annoying "cheats" in the solution. (Which is more than can be said for the Grand Dame of Mystery, Agatha herself). They even have a shop cat named Agatha.
The
pool of suspects is small, and although the denouement and
resolution are fairly easy to guess beforehand, they're well written and
satisfying. It
works perfectly well as a standalone, and is a nice lead-in to the next
book in the series which is due out in 4th quarter 2023. The language is clean, and there's no graphic
violence or sexual
content. This would be a good choice for lovers of light cozies, the
kind with whimsically eccentric small town characters, a town diner, a shop cat, and rural countryside. Readers who are fans of Diane Kelly and Laurie Cass will find a lot to like here.
Four stars. This will appeal to light cozy readers.
Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.
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