Murder During an Electric Christmas Season
A few years ago, we got to visit the fictional Daybreak Island during the Christmas season. Since I love a Christmas cozy, I was happy to see we got a repeat visit for the eighth entry in the series, Shock and Paw.
If you haven’t yet started the Cat Cafe Mysteries, they feature Maddie James, who has returned to her home off the coast of Massachusetts. She has transformed part of her grandparent’s house into a cat cafe, and she lives there with her grandfather and assorted other relatives in the rest of the house. Her return to the island coincided with a murder, and she seems to have the bad luck of getting involved in more over the last year and a half.
This year, the island’s chamber of commerce is really trying to draw visitors to the island for the holiday with extra events. They’re also upping the stakes on the holiday decorating contest. Maddie is trying to avoid getting pulled in to helping plan things, focusing on the cafe instead.
However, she still finds herself getting pulled into the drama surrounding a subpar electrician the city hired to help people prepare for the contest. Other pockets of drama pop up over town as well. But Maddie isn’t expecting for someone to be murdered. Since someone she cares about is the prime suspect, Maddie starts trying to find the killer. Can she cut through the noise to figure out what is going on?
Yes, I’m trying to be a bit vague here. The book takes a while to truly come into focus. We have a bit of this and a bit of that going on, and it seems chaotic. It doesn’t help that the murder happens a little later than is typical in the books I read, and it wasn’t easy to get a read on who the victim would be.
But I had faith that all of this was leading somewhere, and I was right. Once the murder happens, the book really focuses, and everything became part of the investigation. I was quite caught up in the action at this point and had a really hard time putting the book down. And the climax, while a little weaker than I like, did answer all my questions. Still, I feel like there was a better way to pace things that would have fully engrossed me in the story sooner.
I did enjoy getting to spend time with Maddie and the rest of her family and friends again. We have quite a large cast of characters, and some of the more minor ones do tend to fade into the background, at least for me, but the core cast are strong and help pull me in. The suspects are a varied bunch, and I felt they were strong as well. And there are several cute cats, which is always fun.
Plus, we had the Christmas spirit. With one of the storylines involving a Christmas decorating contest, there is plenty of time spent with holiday traditions. We even get some snow on the island to help put us in the festive mood.
While I did have my issues with the pacing, overall, I did enjoy Shock and Paw. Fans of the series will find this one puts them in the Christmas mood.
Book time for the rest of the Cat Café Mysteries.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Thanks for stopping by. In order to combat spam, I moderate most comments. I'll get to your comment as soon as I can.