A Trip with Trouble
Aug. 25th, 2022 09:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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bookheaven
A Trip with Trouble: The Mountain Lodge Mysteries by Diane KellyMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
I received a copy from Netgalley in exchange for an unbiased review. It was more of a 3.5 star review but I'm feeling good today so why not round up. I didn't read book one but that didn't get in the way. The book is divided between Misty, the owner of the Mountain Lodge (In the North Carolina mountain region so nice setting there) and her cat Yeti. To be honest I could do without Yeti as it adds very little but at least it's not talking animals. Mostly Yeti is there to let the reader see things that Misty and her friends don't.
An all-female biker group has booked out the lodge for the week. There's a set of twins (one of whom rides behind her sister as she's vision impaired), a tall secretive one(Katie), the young reckless one (Ericka) one step from being kicked out and Reyna and Gerri, the older leaders of the pack. Gerri's husband's family show up, her stepson and his wife and her husband's ex. The son and the ex-wife are money hungry (for all the money left to Gerri) but the step daughter in law is more concerned with her kids and on secret good terms with Gerri. Add into this motorcycle thieves and mysterious vans spying on businesses you have several clues and red herrings for when the murder happens.
All in all the mystery and the red herrings worked well enough (though wasn't enough to lead me away from the obvious killer because well they were just that). Still Misty, Rocky and their friends are engaging enough. I did enjoy it.
Did I have quibbles? Sure. I always say in cozy mysteries I can only get on board if the cops are friendly/involved with the sleuth and it's a hard no if they hate the protagonist. IN this they are friendly, maybe too friendly since it's not some local cop. It's someone who really doesn't know Misty and it's like why is he so free with information? aw well, that's part and parcel of amateur detectives I suppose.
The ending was a bit of a stretch but I can look past that too. I'd read more of this series.
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