This is the first in the Cat Rescue series by T.C. (Toni) LoTempio. The second one is coming out soon so since I had this book on hand, I wanted to be caught up for the second one. Isn’t the cat on the cover adorable? He’s Toby, the cat who is searching for his perfect human to settle down with.
My Goodreads review:
Purr M for Murder by T.C. LoTempio
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Oh my goodness, this was a good one! I loved the whole idea of pet rescue, mainly cat rescue for the sake of the series and how long time resident of the cat shelter, Toby, was searching for just his perfect human.
Sydney (Syd) McCall has returned home to Deer Park, NC after finding her secretary and fiance (who was also the boss’s son) having an affair. She quit that job and came to work as promotions manager for her sister, Kat, at the Friendly Paws animal shelter. The event they are working on is a cat cafe hosted at Dayna’s Sweet Shop (formerly the McCall family cafe). For a fee, customers can go to an area away from the cafe itself and hang out with cats for a couple of hours and hopefully end up adopting one or two of them.
Trowbridge Littleton is the rich guy in town who make Scrooge look like Santa Claus. He’s upsetting all the merchants in the area by threatening to raise their rent, he’s opposing the cat cafe and rumor has it he is trying to shut down the animal shelter. That is, until someone shuts him down for good. Unfortunately the ones to find him are none other than Kat and Syd so without any other suspects at the moment, the police have them as their top persons of interest.
In the meantime, Detective Will Worthington is getting reacquainted with Syd since they went to school together. She’s able to get little tidbits out of him now and then concerning the murder but when he’s with his senior partner, Detective Hank Bennington, he clams up and is nothing but business.
Syd’s good friend that she’s rooming with, Leila, is a local reporter so together they try to see what they can find out so that the police can start to suspect someone else besides Kat since Kat unfortunately and accidentally spouted out what was taken as a warning to Littleton when he was at the cafe earlier.
Toby, the adorable orange cat who originally was a wanderer, has a big role at the end of the book and anyone reading it will just love it. With his help, Syd solves the murder, manages to escape with her life intact and scores a date with Will. The take down was pretty exciting. I hadn’t guessed who the killer was until the reveal came since there were some great twists and characters who could have been the perp.
I heard the next book in the series is coming soon and I can’t wait to read it!
Cuddle Up With a Cozy Mystery 