This is the first book in the Blue Ridge Library series by Victoria Gilbert. It looks like she’s new to writing, at least from what I saw of her Amazon page, but her writing sounds like she’s been at it for many years. She spins a great mystery and has some fun characters that you will come to love as much as I have! This series had me from the library setting. 😉
Since I’m currently far enough into the second book to confidently be able to tell you this: PLEASE be sure you read THIS book first, then the second! It’s really advisable.
My Goodreads:
A Murder for the Books by Victoria Gilbert
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
This was such a well-written and well-plotted mystery! There were some twists and turns, memorable characters that I already can’t wait to visit again and an awesome side mystery along with the murders that occurred. I definitely didn’t guess the killer!
Amy Webber was the library director at the Taylorsford Public Library in Taylorsford, VA. Her best frieind, Sunny Fields, was her assistant and the only other paid help. After a nasty breakup with her fiance’, Amy came back to live there with her Aunt Lydia in the old family house. The town was fairly uneventful aside from a very old few cases of questionable deaths. That is until a couple of new murders happened. Did they have anything to do with the old cases or could they possibly be linked to the new housing development that was in the works. Amy being a trained researcher as a librarian couldn’t help but start looking into the cases. Her new interest, choreography and dancer Richard Muir, only wanted to protect her in case the killer was still around, but he had to admit it was interesting investigating, especially the parts involving the older cases and seeing how the new cases could be related.
I love libraries to begin with and any mystery concerning someone who works in one has my interest. I enjoyed all the characters and their interactions with each other and with Amy. It was like she’d never been gone as far as the older people were concerned. Richard was a sweetheart and I can’t wait to see how their budding relationship develops. I hope that Sunny can eventually bring herself to dating Brad, the chief deputy who obviously had it pretty bad for her all those years, even after she rejected him in high school. As abrasive as Brad started out in the story, I wasn’t sure I was going to like him, but he did have a good side and finally came around. At least he wasn’t constantly warning Amy off the case or telling her he’d toss her in jail for interfering.
I’m really anxious to read the next book, in fact I had started it but since there was only one book ahead of it, I thought I’d be happier if I read book one first. But that’s just me. 😉
Cuddle Up With a Cozy Mystery 