DEATH IN DARK BLUE by Julia Buckley

KILLER CHARACTERS by Ellery Adams

DEATH IN DARK BLUE

Book 2 in the Writer's Apprentice Mysteries

by Julia Buckley

An aspiring suspense author finds herself writing mysteries by day and solving them by night in the second Writer’s Apprentice Mystery by the author of A Dark and Stormy Murder and the Undercover Dish Mysteries.

In the quaint town of Blue Lake, Indiana, Lena London is settling into her dream job, but someone is making her life a nightmare…

Things are beginning to go right for Lena. She’s got a new job assisting suspense novelist and friend, Camilla Graham. She lives rent-free in Camilla’s beautiful, Gothic house. She even has a handsome new boyfriend, Sam West.

After being under attack by the media and his neighbors, Sam has recently been cleared of suspicion for murder. Journalists and townsfolk alike are remorseful, and one blogger would even like to apologize to him in person. But when she’s found dead behind Sam’s house, Lena must dodge paparazzi as she unravels the many mysteries that threaten to darken the skies of her little town and her newfound love with Sam.

MY REVIEW

DEATH IN DARK BLUE, is wonderful follow up to the first book in this series, A DARK AND STORMY MURDER.

Author Julia Buckley has penned a cozy with a bit of a Gothic feel. The house, and the surroundings could be straight of a Poe novel. The characters are deeper than most in this genre. They are wonderful, and have that cozy element, but they are a little more dramatic, maybe even a little more intense at times. It totally works.

Julia Buckley start each chapter off with a snippet of the novel, DEATH ON THE DANUBE, which is a novel written by, Camilla Graham, one of the main characters in the Writer’s Apprentice Mysteries. I found myself looking forward to each new chapter just to see what was happening in that story. It really was like reading two books at once, and I loved it!

DEATH IN DARK BLUE was so well done. Planned out brilliantly by the author, there were parts in this whodunit that made me shiver. And there is a twist at the end that left me with a dropped jaw. Seriously, I never saw it coming. Well done, Ms. Buckley. Brava!

📕📖📗📚📘📖📙

KILLER CHARACTERS

Book 8 in the Books by the Bay Mysteries

by Ellery Adams

From the New York Times bestselling author of Writing All Wrongs, it’s a rotten state of affairs in Oyster Bay, and the Bayside Book Writers are out to end a nasty plot...
 
Restaurant owner and aspiring novelist Olivia Limoges is happily enjoying her new marriage. Sadly, the same doesn’t hold true for Laurel, a fellow Bayside Book Writer. While struggling with a demanding job, twin boys, and a terminally ill mother-in-law, Laurel learns that her perfect marriage is mostly fictional. When she catches her husband fooling around with his mother’s hospice nurse, she issues impassioned threats that will later come back to haunt her.  
 
After the nurse meets a deadly denouement, Chief Rawlings is forced to take Laurel into custody. While Olivia protests the arrest, the rest of the Bayside Book Writers become a group divided, with Rawlings and Harris on one side and Olivia and Millay on the other. Now the women must race against the clock to prove that Laurel’s not the sort for murder before her story ends in tragedy…

MY REVIEW

KILLER CHARACTERS is a wonderful mystery that is the essence of the author, Ellery Adams.

When I opened this book, before I even started reading the story, my eyes fell upon the words . . . To You, Dear Reader. The eloquent words that followed in this “letter” to us, had tearing gliding down my face as I realized Ellery Adams was bidding the Book by the Bay Mysteries a fond farewell. Yet, within that sadness, she promised us new adventure.

In this eighth installment of the series, Ms. Adams has given us her best. The characters we’ve loved over the last “almost” decade, come alive like never before. Their lives, like ours have changed and grown, and I for one am happy to have been included in the adventure. And while they are leaving us, some will continue to always be with us. (Hi Fred and Duncan!)

As is the norm with this series, KILLER CHARACTERS was a killer mystery from beginning to end. A master of her craft, Ms. Adams planted clues both hidden, and right under the reader’s nose. The author had me not only second, but triple guessing myself. As the conclusion grew near, I completely tuned out the rest of the world and lost myself in the story until the final word. Fantastic.

To barrow a partial quote from the beginning of the book . . .”End? No, the journey doesn’t here . . . ~ J.R.R. Tolken. Thank you for the reassurance, Ellery.

Both titles are now available for pre-order

and release

May 2!

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