Book Review: Third Time's a Crime by Diana Orgain (Love or Money Mysteries #3)

Stars: 4 out of 5

Pros: Completely enjoyable story; great job with characters

Cons: Mystery overshadowed by other plot lines at times.

The Bottom Line:

Castle set cold case

Coupled with current murder

Lots of fun to read

Solving This Cold Case is Murder

With all the TV I watch, I have been loving Diana Orgain’s Love or Money Mysteries.  Each book in the series is set during a different reality TV series as Georgia Thornton finds herself trying to win the contest and solve a crime.  She’s back for a third show in Third Time’s a Crime, and it would be a crime to skip this book.

Georgia and her boyfriend Scott have teamed up for Cold Case in the Castle, a new show that pits five teams of two against each other in a race to solve an unsolved murder from 1968.  At the time, this old castle outside of Golden, California, was used to rehabilitate wayward teens.  One of those teens was found dead in the castle’s kitchen, but the killer was never caught.

Because of this and other things, the castle is rumored to be haunted, and events when the cast and crew first show up to seem to bear that out.  However, things take a deadly turn when Georgia finds a dead body in the castle’s empty pool the next morning.  The freaky thing is the man drowned.  Is this modern murder related to the mystery Georgia is already trying to solve?

If you are looking for a book filled with spooky atmosphere, this is the book for you.  It’s hard not to feel the shivers from the opening pages as Georgia gets her first look at the castle.  That continues throughout the book as Georgia gets caught up in solving the case.

The pace of the book never slows down as there is always something happening.  However, that isn’t always related to the mystery.  There are plenty of other conflicts in the book, especially between the contestants, and those tend to take center stage.  However, I only realized this after I’d finished the book.  It is still a completely enjoyable read.  And the mystery itself does come a logical and satisfying conclusion.

Because of the nature of the series, there aren’t many returning characters.  Georgia and Scott get a sub-plot that enhances both of them and really makes sense based on what has happened to them in the first two books in the series.  All the contestants for the reality show can be overwhelming at times, but Diana Orgain does an excellent job of helping us keep them all straight early on in the book.  I never once felt like I needed to go back and look up who they were, and as the book goes along and we get to know them better, this becomes a complete non-issue.

Third Time’s a Crime is something different for the cozy genre, and as such is completely enjoyable.  Pick it up today and get caught up in a cold case and a modern mystery filled with atmosphere.

NOTE: I received a copy of this book.

Giveaway!

Thanks to the publisher, I have one copy of this book to give away.  Because it is a physical book, the contest is limited to residence of the US.

Just leave me a comment with your e-mail address so I can get in touch with you if you win.  I will pick the winner next Tuesday, January 10th, so please leave your comment before 12:01AM Pacific Time on 1/10.  You will have until midnight on 1/15 to get back to me, or I will choose a new winner on 1/16.