Booked 4 Murder–review

This was such a fun book! It’s the first book in the Sophie Kimball series, written by husband and wife team of Ann Goldfarb and Jim Clapp aka J.C. Eaton. I just the first in their new Wine Trail series and already knew I loved their writing style. This book starts with Minnesota and Arizona in September, a super warm month yet for Arizona and Phee at times probably wondered what she was thinking when she told her mom she’d look into her book club problem for her by coming out for a visit.

I loved the idea of Phee’s mom having a little chiweenie as her companion–this is the best unlicensed picture I could come up with. I wish Phee liked little Streetman better than she currently does!

My Goodreads review:

Booked 4 Murder by J.C. Eaton

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I can’t believe I waited so long to read this book! I was sucked in from the very beginning and could barely put it down. Phee and her mom were such great characters together, yeah maybe her mom is a tad annoying but isn’t everyone’s a little that way? The person I guessed was not the perp, and I even went for a kind of obscure person.

Sophia “Phee” Kimball got a call from her mom, frantically saying that the book their book club was reading was cursed since three people had already died after reading it. Phee tried to reason with her mom but she knew early on she’d end up down in Arizona from Minnesota. Phee’s good friend, Nate, a detective with the police department where she was in accounts receivable, encouraged her to go. He said she always did such a good job of tracking down receipts and things like that, she’d be a natural for investigating. Phee didn’t really know where to begin, but with Nate’s guidance, she soon had a lot of good information, including what her mother had written down for her before she got there.

I loved how Nate and Phee would share info and how he’d get the tech guy helping her. It was kind of refreshing not to have the main character worrying about which guy she likes, and instead have the male character she’s interacting with be 20 years older and more her mentor. That gave her time to be more concerned with finding out the answer to what ended up being a whole trail of secrets and puzzles that led to the senior ladies’ deaths. Was it murder or was someone using the supposed-curse to their advantage? Who would want to off these sweet old ladies? You’ll have to read and find out. You’ll be surprised and pleased with the ending. Phee somewhat got to Miss Marple and Poirot her findings, but that final book meeting/reveal was pretty hilarious at times.

I really like what happened at the very end of the book when she returned to her office job. You’ll know if you read book blurbs, but I don’t want to be responsible for spoiling it for someone. All I know is, book 2 here I come.

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