I love the Sophie Katz series - they're murder mysteries and they definitely aren't hard-boiled or even soft, but cozy purists will cry foul of the language and the fact that people are getting lucky (although it's not at all graphic). Still, I consider the series to be cozy, maybe chick-lit-ish. Very witty, humorous, writing with strong female characters, the MC is a mystery writer who finds herself stumbling over dead bodies with alarming frequency.

Seven Swans a'Shooting is obviously meant to be a holiday novella, and it takes place around the holiday season, but I think it's one that could really be enjoyed any time of year; it really didn't feel "Christmassy" to me. Which is sorta a good thing, since I didn't find it until just the other day.

I rated this 4 stars mostly because I just loved being able to see these people again (I don't know if there's going to be another book, I believe the last one ended up self-published). The mystery is not only not difficult to solve, there really isn't a whole lot of time for it to be mysterious - everything is neatly wrapped up in 7 shortish chapters.

I'd recommend this to anyone who loves Sophie and her friends as much as I do, or anyone who might be interested in the series as a way of testing the waters before jumping into a full length book. ( )