A boring, lackluster mystery full of stupid characters, even dumber scenarios, and a lot of desperately unfunny attempts at humor.

Jaine Austen’s Christmas plans are turned upside down when her ‘best friend’ Lance announces he has accepted a job for the two of them to housesit a ritzy Bel Air mansion for two weeks over the upcoming holidays. When they arrive, they meet the weird next door neighbors—Missy and Scotty. Scotty is a loathsome former child star whose abrasive personality and niggardly ways have made an enemy of everyone in the neighborhood, including his own wives—both current and former. When Jaine discovers Scotty dead, clobbered over the head with a day-old Yule log, she becomes a prime suspect and clumsily sets out to clear her own name.

It is risible to even refer to Jaine Austen as an amateur sleuth because she is such a clueless moron. As Jaine bumbles through the sloppy plotline, she labels all of the characters as ‘the killer’ at some point or another; she is convinced that Every. Single. One. of them just has to be the murderer. Of course, it is the one and only character Jaine pays zero attention to who turns out to be the real culprit. Duh. It really comes as no surprise since everything Jaine does is so idiotic.

Even something as prosaic as Jaine’s eating habits unmask her as a colossal nitwit. The author wastes countless pages expounding on Jaine’s hatred of kale and tofu. (Jaine has an aversion to health food that borders on the psychotic.) At some point, she goes to a (gasp!) vegetarian restaurant (oh, the horror!) & orders an avocado & mozzarella sandwich, which Jaine proclaims is all right except for all of the godawful sprouts that got crammed into it. It never seems to occur to Jaine’s pea-sized brain to ask the restaurant to leave the sprouts off (restaurants will do little things like that, you know), or to even take them off herself after the fact; given Jaine’s limited capabilities, she probably would have needed a diagram and instruction book to accomplish even that minor feat. (I guess one can’t really expect too much from a person with such numskull parents they can’t even spell the name Jane properly.) Seriously, this woman needs to be in a home for incompetents.

Jaine’s inability to ever stand up for herself renders her even more pathetic and unlikeable. Whether it’s her endless (and I do mean ENDLESS) stream of hellish blind dates, or her constant inability to reclaim her own cat, or her refusal to tell Lance to go to hell every time he refers to how ugly she is, Jaine never has any brains, any backbone, or any semblance of self-worth. She is quite literally one of the most dimwitted and useless cozy mystery heroines I have ever encountered, and that is saying quite a lot.

The only character who is even more odious than Jaine is her gay, self-centered, verbally abusive, drama-queen best friend Lance. Lance’s two favorite words are fab & hon, and he uses them with stomach-churning frequency. Lance is a cruel, manipulative liar who is constantly putting Jaine down and reminding her how fat and unattractive she is while simultaneously forcing her into doing things she doesn’t want to do. Lance does things like accepting a Christmas job for Jaine without asking her first, and creating a horrific online dating profile for her behind her back. Isn’t he a peach? Lance is no one’s idea of a decent human being, yet Jaine puts up with all of his crap because he buys her expensive presents. (!?!?!?) And the author treats this behavior as comedic gold that will have readers rolling in the aisles with laughter. Offensively nauseating doesn’t even begin to describe it.

And amongst all of this horrifying drivel, we are subjected to thoroughly irrelevant emails from Jaine’s parents about the Caribbean cruise they are taking with their cult-like HOA. I have no clue what the point of that was, except to say that it was utterly pointless nonsense.

Run, don’t walk, away from this horrible series! ( )

Jaine and her neighbor Lance are house-sitting for a wealthy lady with a house full of antiques. Jaine tries to board her cat Prozac in a ritzy boarding place, but things go awry and they’re forced to depend on the neighbors of the lady they’re house sitting for, who turn out to be quite odd. After several strange interactions between both Jaine and Lance, and also several other couples in the neighborhood, someone turns up dead and Jaine, who is a suspect, feels compelled to investigate to clear her name. I enjoyed the mystery in this one. In terms of how much Christmas and holiday-themed stuff there was in this book, I would probably rate it 3 candy canes out of 5. Overall, I liked the mystery and characters (and as always, the emails from Jaine’s parents.) ( )

Scotty Parker is a former child star who once played Tiny Tim, but now he’s grown up into the role of neighborhood Scrooge. He cuts the wires on his neighbors’ Christmas display and tells the kids that Santa had a stroke. His miserly, bah-humbug attitude lasts year-round, a fact known all too well by everyone who knows him.

Scotty thinks he can stage a comeback with the screenplay he’s working on (The Return of Tiny Tim: Vengeance Is Mine!). Jaine is reluctantly recruited to help him edit the horrible screenplay. When Scotty is bludgeoned to death with a frozen chocolate yule log, the police start making a list of suspects. Jaine’s name is unfortunately at the top of the list

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Series: A Jaine Austen Mystery - Book 16
Author: Laura Levine
Genre: Cozy/Holiday Mystery
Publisher: Kensington Books

Publishing Date; September 25, 2018

Laura Levine is a talented writer. Her characters are modern, quirky, and written with an eye towards the current world we live in. Death of a Neighborhood Scrooge is the sixteenth book in this series, and like most of the other books, it is filled with lots of clues, suspects and dating issues for Lance and Jaine. Jaine isn’t having much luck herself, and that is what makes the two characters work well together.

Jaine Austen is a writer, mainly ads. She doesn’t mind the work but hopes for better. Working with the victim is a bit overwhelming for her especially as she, like most everyone else, doesn’t like him. Lance is not really any help and is too self-centered to really care. Other characters in this book are far too sporadic to worry the reader; most are not memorable.

The Jaine Austen Mystery series is popular and well liked. But I have an issue with this particular book. Anyone who would hand over their beloved pet to a complete stranger is incredibly callous, not to mention irresponsible. Especially when Jaine lives within easy driving range of Scotty. This is a big sticking point for me as a reader and as a pet owner. Then top it off with the fact that the strangers treat Prozac as if he belongs to them without asking Jaine’s permission for how the cat is taken care of, and Jaine allows this to continue throughout the story, makes it unbelievable. Add in that the victim is so unlikable that the reader will wonder why someone didn’t kill him sooner; this makes it hard for the reader to care about any of the characters. Unfortunately, mix all of this with the ending, and I’m afraid that I can’t give this book a high rating.

Overall, Death of a Neighborhood Scrooge is a fast-paced, easy-to-read story that has moments of entertainment. If readers love this series, they will most likely enjoy this new addition, if they didn’t enjoy it previously, that won’t change.
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When Jaine Austen and her cat, Prozac, head off to Bel Air to house sit during the holidays with her bff, Lance, she expects a quiet holiday full of upscale shopping and helping Lance get over his latest broken heart with lots and lots of chocolate. When their next door neighbour, a one-time child actor and full-time curmudgeon, is murdered, Jaine becomes the main suspect but there are plenty of people who despised him including both his present and ex wife. Jaine decides the only way to prove her innocence is to unmask the culprit herself. Unfortunately, her sleuthing skills are a bit off, what with Prozac deciding to transfer his affections elsewhere and Lance's efforts to find her a date, not to mention the emails her parents are sending her about their adventures on their holiday cruise.

Death of a Neighborhood Scrooge by Laura Levine is, for the most part, a fun, fast, and humorous holiday cosy. At times, it did seem to drag and the humour was sort of hit and miss for me but, overall, I did enjoy it especially her parents' emails - easily the funniest part of the book.

Thanks to Netgalley and Kensington Books for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review ( )