In Peppermint Peril

2.5 stars it was an ok cozy, but I didn't feel the christmas cheer. I even forgot it was supposed to be a Christmas cozy.

The mystery was twisty and the setting was good! To be honest though this is more of a 3.5 for me because I just didn't love any of the characters. Now, [slight spoiler] some of the truly hateful characters do turn around by the end of the book, and that's awesome. But it was a little hard getting far enough into the book to see them change.

Also – this is a super small, grammarian thing, so please forgive me for saying it! – the author writes dialogue in kind of a confusing way. Anytime someone does something while speaking, she breaks it into two paragraphs instead of one, often just using a pronoun to introduce the new dialogue. I find that makes me work harder to follow the conversation– and as an author who really works hard on my dialogue, it feels sloppy to me. I'm not a devoted Christie reader but I have noticed that Agatha Christie formatted dialogue in a similar style and her influence is really clear in this book. (In both good and – in this case, to me – less-good ways.) There might not be anything technically wrong with doing that, it just is a tiny pet peeve of mine. Rant over! xD

In short, Agatha Christie and classic mystery fans will probably want to give this one a look!

This book was just OK for me. The mystery was well done and kept me guessing right up until the end, but none of the characters were particularly likable. Plus, the dialogue came off very stiff and formal at times. This was especially noticeable with the deputy, who came across so wooden and flat personality wise. I enjoyed it enough to finish it, but I doubt I'll be picking up any more books in the series.