What I'm Reading Wednesday

This week's review is Buried In A Book by Lucy Arlington.

Blurb:  After losing her job as a journalist at the age of forty-five, Lila Wilkins accepts an internship at A Novel Idea, a thriving literary agency in North Carolina. Being paid to read seems perfect to Lila, although it's difficult with the cast of quirky co-workers and piles of query letters. But when a penniless aspiring author drops dead in the agency's waiting room-and Lila discovers a series of threatening letters-she's determined to find out who wrote him off.

Review:  I'm always on the look out for a new good cozy mystery series and the first book in Lucy Arlington's A Novel Idea Series is just that.

I liked that Lila was an older protagonist who had life experience to bring to her amateur sleuthing. I felt that being older and having suffered a few setbacks in her life, such as losing her job and having to start over, made it easier to believe why she became so invested in finding out who murdered Marlette even though he was a stranger to her. I felt she empathized with him because he had also suffered setbacks in his life that changed everything for him.

I enjoyed Lila's co-workers. Each one was  a fully well rounded character and not just a cardboard character inserted into the story as a prop for Lila. At times throughout the book, I was certain at least two of her co-workers were the killer. I was wrong on both counts.

What I enjoyed most about the book was the fact that I didn't guess who the actual murder was and why the person felt it necessary to murder not just Marlette, but another character as well. To me, a well written mystery is one that keeps me guessing who the murder is and Ms. Arlington planted great red herrings that kept me doing just that.

There were a couple of things that I felt detracted from the story. The first was Lila's son moving to a commune with no word to his mother who worried that something terrible had happened to him and reported him missing. It made him seem inconsiderate and heartless. While the commune and one of its members plays into the plot, I felt having Lila's son move there could have been handled a bit better so as not make him out to be such a jerk to his mother.

The other thing that I felt wasn't fully developed was the character of Addison. She was the intern at the literary agency before Lila started. It was hinted at by the agency owner that Addison was a less than stellar employee. When Lila asked Addison about her time at the agency, she said it was a terrible place to work, but no specifics were ever given about why she hated it or why the owner thought she was a terrible intern. Such a big deal was made over it that I wish the author had tied up this subplot instead of just glossing over it.

I enjoyed the book even though there were a few minor items that kept me from giving a 5 Star rating, so I do plan on reading the next two books in the series.

Rating:  4 Stars