A Book to Kill For by Harper Lin

 

Reviewed by Kristin

Discovering Harper Lin audiobooks on READS has kept me amused while driving to and from work, and she certainly does have a wide variety of series from which to choose. Lin writes mysteries featuring bakeries, cats, cafes, holidays, senior sleuths, southern sleuths, and finally, books. This prolific author either has cloned herself or she just has ideas bubbling out of her head and very quick typing fingers. (This might be a good time to recommend going to www.fantasticfiction.com which does an excellent job of listing authors’ series and non-series books.) For those of you who do prefer a physical book over digital, right on our new shelf is Lin’s latest offering, A Book to Kill For.

Maggie Bell is a fairly stereotypical bookworm who loves working at the Whitfield Bookshop in the small town of Fair Haven, Connecticut. She enjoys her conversations with Mr. Alexander Whitfield, and the chance to read her way through the stock during the quiet hours when very few customers are browsing the stacks. When she finds her boss dead within the first chapter, Maggie’s world is turned upside down.

Mr. Whitfield’s son Joshua arrives in town with great plans for renovating his father’s bookshop into a book café which might actually make a profit. Joshua has much different ideas than his father about the types of books which will draw people into the store. Beach books? Vampires? Popular fiction? Shocked, Maggie just wants to curl into herself and hide among the classic stories. Good looking as Joshua might be, he doesn’t have much interest in reading. Oh, the horror!

The storyline progresses rather predictably, but if cozy mysteries are your cup of tea, then this one will not disappoint. I’m sure that many other townspeople will find themselves bludgeoned, poisoned, or otherwise endangered all for the sake of a plotline in coming titles. As an amateur sleuth with a sleek black cat named Poe by her side, Maggie surely will find the handily dropped clues and save the day.

If you’re interested in Lin’s senior sleuth Barbara Gold, check out her “Granny” series about a former CIA agent who is not slowing down (much) in her retirement, reviewed here.