Book Review: The Tell-Tale Homicide by Daphne Silver (Rare Books Cozy Mysteries #2)

Stars: 2 out of 5

Pros: Most of the returning characters

Cons: Poor editing, especially for the timeline, and poor pacing 

The Bottom Line:

Body with rare book

Poor editing and timeline

Other weaknesses

The Tale of the Poor Sequel

I enjoyed the first book in Daphne Silver’s first book enough to pick up the sequel, The Tell-Tale Homicide. Sadly, it was very disappointing. 

The series features rare books librarian Juniper Blume, who has just taken a job in Rose Mallow, Maryland. She grew up visiting the town in the summer, and she’s moving there to be closer to her sister and niece. She’s taken a job working for the Calverton Foundation to help turn their private collection into a museum. 

But on her first day, she starts to wonder if that is a good idea. She’s met with a group of protestors who are angry with the Calverton Family because of their plans for the town. Plus, there’s the fact that the incredibly handsome Leo Calverton is now her boss. Maybe she shouldn’t be dating him. 

But the second day is when things really get rocky. She finds a dead man in the Calverton’s private library holding what appears to be an early Edgar Allan Poe book that went missing from their collection. How did he get in? And who killed him?

What went wrong? Honestly, just about everything. 

Let’s start with my personal pet peeve. I haven’t commented on it for a while, but in this book it is too glaring to ignore. The timeline is all over the place. Days magically appear and disappear at random. Coincidentally, I read this book the week leading up to Labor Day. The book is supposed to be all set in September. It needs at least two weeks to take place. But the end takes place the Thursday before Labor Day. And everything suddenly all happened in a week. Yes, I was actually yelling at the book at one point there were so many of these errors.

Usually, these types of things are annoying to me but minor. I’d not them in passing because authors are human and can make mistakes. This time? The poor editing made me question is other inconsistencies were errors or characters hiding things. So yes, it impacted the rest of the book for me. And yes, there were some other editing errors that should have been caught with a solid front to back read. There were just too many to ignore.

Not that the plot was that great to begin with. It meandered all over the place with little focus until the final third. And part of what happened in the climax comes out of nowhere and is never explained. 

Then there’s the storyline with the protests in town. Aside from how Juniper is treated (don’t get me started on one scene in particular), there’s also the fact that the end here feels anti-climactic. 

This book makes a few comments that reflect some modern attitudes. While they might have made me slightly annoyed in another book, here, they were just one more annoyance on top of everything else. 

The one redeeming feature was Juniper. I really do like her, and most of the characters we met in the first book. It’s why I wish this book had been better overall. 

Most of the reviews I’ve seen for this book have been positive, so maybe it is just me. But I can’t recommend The Tell-Tale Homicide.