Writing: 4/5 Plot: 3.5/5 Characters: 4/5
This was a real palate cleanser for me. A light and funny murder mystery written by a woman who typically writes award-winning Steampunk and Horror novels. Leda Foley is an “inconsequential psychic” who is struggling to get over the murder of her fiancée (Tod) a few years before. Her life consists largely of “Klairvoyant Karaoke” at a local bar and getting her travel agency (Foley’s Far-Fetched Flights of Fancy) going. Until one day she manages to save the life of a Seattle cop who is investigating a murder that just might be tied to Tod’s murder … Lots of fun references to the Seattle goth scene (I think? Some scene anyway!) and favorite (to me) places such as Elliot Bay Books and the Seattle Central Library. Irreverent, tongue-in-cheek tone.
Some good quotes: Quotes:
• “But this was the granddaddy of them all — eleven geometrically styled stories of pure, weapons-grade knowledge.” (About the Seattle Central library)
• “Dude pronoun for the sake of statistical likelihood, though I wouldn’t count out his wife. If anyone hated that guy as much as I did, it’s probably her.”
• “Steve folds like a paper crane any time someone mentions about the cops.”
• “… and a waistcoat with a pocket watch that said he visited the nineteenth century in his downtime, for funsies.”
• “An army of ankle-high canines spilled out of the house, swarmed Grady’s feet like furry piranhas, and followed both men back inside — where they thoroughly sniffed the newcomer, deemed him harmless, and immediately began fighting over whose belly he’d pet first.”
Thank you to Atria Books and NetGalley for providing an advance copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. The book will be published on October 26th, 2021.
Books to look forward to ... 