While visiting the land of Miss Marple and Sherlock Holmes, bookstore owner and amateur sleuth Samantha Washington finds herself on a tragical mystery tour . . . Sam joins Nana Jo and her Shady Acres Retirement Village friends Irma, Dorothy, and Ruby Mae on a weeklong trip to London, England, to experience the Peabody Mystery Lovers Tour. The chance to see the sights and walk the streets that … the sights and walk the streets that inspired Agatha Christie and Arthur Conan Doyle is a dream come true for Sam—and a perfect way to celebrate her new publishing contract as a mystery author.
But between visits to Jack the Ripper’s Whitechapel district and 221B Baker Street, Major Horace Peabody is found dead, supposedly of natural causes. Despite his employer’s unfortunate demise, the tour guide insists on keeping calm and carrying on—until another tourist on their trip also dies under mysterious circumstances. Now it’s up to Sam and the Shady Acres ladies to mix and mingle among their fellow mystery lovers, find a motive, and turn up a murderer . . .
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A Tourist’s Guide to Murder by V.M. Burns was another fun and engaging adventure with Samantha, Nana Jo, Ruby Mae, Dorothy and Irma. It was an incredible opportunity to experience Great Britain and many settings that were featured in mysteries written by many British authors or settings that influenced their writing.
With a well-crafted quickly paced plot, several suspects, a few deft twists and turns that kept me guessing, I didn’t put this book down until I finished it. Ms. Burns’ descriptive writing has developed the characters so well over these last few books that I feel like I could easily be friends with all of these ladies. Samantha’s historical mystery within the mystery was a lovely cozy historical that tied right in with Samantha and the Shady Acres ladies current murder mystery. I look forward to more mysteries with Samantha, Nana Jo, Ruby Mae, Dorothy and Irma.
I voluntarily reviewed an Advance Reader Copy of this book from Kensington via NetGalley. All of the above opinions are my own.
I think it’s unfair to new readers for it not to be clear that this series has a secondary historical mystery storyline in each book that may be as long, if not longer than the central story listed in the blurb. One section of the second story in this book was about 28 pages.
It would also be nice if in book 7 the secondary characters get to be fleshed out some more instead of being one dimensional. Maybe take a turn in each subsequent book to let each helper “shine”. I was also unhappy that the fate of two characters introduced in the last book weren’t mentioned. Even with two sentences about how they were missed, where they ended up and that they were doing well. The thread was left dangling without a knot. I also spotted one name blooper which maybe corrected when the final version hits the shelves.
That said, I still give the half I read a like. I enjoyed the story and setting.
I received my copy from Netgalley in exchange for my honest review.