Mages & Murder is a light cozy fantasy mystery by L. Evans. Either on hold or withdrawn from publication temporarily, it was due out 1st April 2024 from the author.
This is firmly in the cozy fantasy mystery subgenre. An unpleasant mage seeks shelter in a storm in the inn of a former mercenary and turns up dead (after managing to annoy and harass more or less everyone he encountered). It's a classic closed suspect pool setup with an isolated setting, cut off from outside help as a result of a blizzard, with a limited list of suspects for the mercenary, Leonor, to disentangle.
It's an indie-published work, and as such, could've benefited from a more thorough editing process. According to the author's substack, she translated and updated the novella from the original French. There are some minor typos and awkward French to English sentence constructions, but overall, it's entertaining. Inevitable comparisons will be made between this work and Legends & Lattes, and it suffers by comparison. It's enjoyable in its own right, and should be read as such.
Four stars. It's possible that it's available directly from the publisher, but that information isn't readily available.
Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.
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