Erika Chase

2.5...it’s vacation! That’s my excuse for choosing a pure potboiler lacking substance. Lizzie Turner is a busy lady in Little Ashton Corners AL. She is an elementary reading specialist by day, a literacy teacher, book club host, choir member and amateur sleuth during all other hours. Quite contrived, but still fun. At the very first meeting of Lizzie’s mystery book club which includes her best friend Sally Jo, some literacy students with issues, a retired police chief and her mentor/mother figure Molly, a murder occurs right outside the house after a stranger wanders in and asks to use the phone. The club become suspects, though not really for any police dept worth it’s salt. Just so happens the new chief in town is Lizzie’s former HS crush. So there’s that plot line. The book club begins doing its own fumbling investigations, especially Lizzie who probably want to impress Mark. She is also receiving unsolicited anonymous manuscript chapters, and middle of the night phone calls that require her to confront her father’s accidental death when she was a little girl. Lots going on and we always get info parceled out through Lizzie’s daily routine including what she ate and wore. Lots of cookie baking in this southern setting. Other complaints: people don’t know each other better in this small town and the neighboring one might as well be Mars. Police can’t get a clue, literally. And even though it is a current setting the internet doesn’t seem to give anyone useful info. Thumbs up for Lizzie’s literary leanings and the chapter captions which come from other potboilers: “Chapter and Hearse,” “Tressed to Kill,” “Her Royal Spyness” — complete lust included at the end. This is the first in a series. Next up “Read and Buried.” If you like your mysteries light, fluffy and pulpy, jump right in.… (meer)

The members of the Ashton Corners Mystery Readers and Cheese Straws Society are all chipping in as Molly Mathews, now owner of the bookstore the Book Nook, prepares the first annual Mystery Book Fair. While gossip circulates about the guest authors, club member Lizzie Turner is unpleasantly surprised to see a certain book publicist make an appearance. It seems Lizzie has a history with Ashley Dixon—a chapter of her life she’d rather leave closed. But when someone gives Ashley a death sentence, Lizzie becomes the prime suspect in a murder mystery she can’t put down. Now Lizzie and her fellow book buffs have to read between the lines of the publicist’s past and catch the real killer before Lizzie is written off for good.

I read this book first and have not read any others in the series. It was good as a standalone but it did mention things that had happened in the past. There were a few minor things that didn't seem to fit well, mostly references and scenes with Lizzie's mother. Overall it was a good book. I liked the characters and the writing. I will definitely try to find the other books in this series and read them.
… (meer)