A Call for Kelp by Bree Baker Series: Seaside Café Mystery #4
Genres: Adult, Mystery/Thriller
Published by Poisoned Pen Press on May 26, 2020
Also by this author: Live and Let Chai , No Good Tea Goes Unpunished, Tide and Punishment
Format: Audio/Physical (352 pages) • Source: Hoopla, Owned
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It's sink or swim for Everly with her most bizarre case yet!
Everly Swan is busy as a bee running her beachside iced tea shop, and the small island of Charm, North Carolina is abuzz-Mitzi Calgon, an iconic Hollywood actress, is in town! Everly's great-aunts are making a documentary about beekeeping and Mira has agreed to help. But when the actress turns up dead, reporters and fans swarm the island, muddying the water and disrupting the peaceful lives of the townspeople.
Everly's never been good at minding her own beeswax, so she starts following her own leads and combing through the evidence. Then there's the mystery of Detective Hays-ever since their kiss under the mistletoe, he's been acting distant. And he's annoyingly determined to keep Everly away from the case. But when she receives a cryptic warning to "Bee Careful", Everly realizes that she's gotten herself into a really sticky situation...
The fourth book in Bree Baker's Seaside Café Mystery series, readers of Joanne Fluke and Kate Carlisle will love A Call for Kelp!
A CALL FOR KELP follows Everly as she helps her aunts get their beekeeping documentary off the ground. They were chosen among a ton of applicants, so a film crew heads down to Charm, NC to begin shooting. The old school actress leading the project and providing the voiceover turns up dead and as usual, Everly springs into action.
I’m still enjoying this series overall but this one was too predictable for me. I knew within the first few chapters who the murderer was even though their motivations were not super clear… even in the end! Baker could have used a little more development there. There were a lot of chapters were something dramatic would happen to end the chapter and then the next chapter would jump ahead in time, allowing Everly to reflect on what happen but the reader didn’t get to see it. For example, she got locked in a library and was panicking at the end of the chapter. The next chapter begins and she’s already rescued, explaining to the reader how she got out. Why not just give us the scene?
The other major issue: Everly’s obsession with her weight and her fitness tracker was unbearable in this one. It felt like every single chapter she had to reference her size, the fitness watch beeping at her, how hard it was to move around at a size 12 (!!) – the list goes on and on. I just did not want to hear it for so many reasons.
All in all, it was a breezy read I finished in a few sittings. I’m going to wait until October until I read the next book because it’s set at Halloween (and I need a little break from the weight drama), but I do plan to finish this series by the end of the year. Three left!
I received this book for free (hey, thanks!) in exchange for an honest review. I promise that this does NOT affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review. For real.
Summer Romance by Annabel Monaghan Genres: Adult, Contemporary
Published by Penguin on June 4, 2024
Also by this author: Same Time Next Summer
Format: Audio/eARC (368 pages) • Source: Publisher, Spotify Audiobooks
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Benefits of a summer romance: it’s always fun, always brief, and no one gets their heart broken.
There aren’t enough labeled glass containers to contain the mess that is Ali Morris’s life. Her mom died two years ago, then her husband left, and she hasn’t worn pants with a zipper in longer than she cares to remember. She’s a professional organizer whose pantry is a disgrace.
No one is more surprised than Ali when the first time she takes off her wedding ring and puts on pants with hardware—overalls count, right?—she meets someone. Or rather, her dog claims a man for her in the same way he claimed his favorite of her three children: by peeing on him. Ethan smiles at Ali like her pants are just right—like he likes what he sees. The last thing Ali needs is to make her life messier, but there’s no harm in a little Summer Romance. Is there?
The synopsis for SUMMER ROMANCE gives nothing away, but I knew I was probably going to love it. I still haven’t read Monaghan’s debut adult romance but I was kind of obsessed with SAME TIME NEXT SUMMER when I read it last year. Her writing was so addicting and enjoyable.
I think it was really fun to go in without knowing what exactly would happen – so many hidden tropes in this one (some of my favorites too!). It’s a testament to how much I want to read her books that I read a story involving fresh grief, fresh divorce, and a MC with young children – a few things I tend to avoid. Monaghan did a great job weaving those elements into the story without making it feel like it was ABOUT those topics. It really was about a summer romance and a main character finding herself again after many years of living in a fog.
I’ll be honest – it took me so long to get into this! I was never in the mood to pick it up during the early chapters and I do think it’s because I didn’t know what to expect. In the back of my mind I knew once I sat down and actually read it, I’d finish it in a sitting… and that’s pretty much what happened.
The male love interest is a skateboarder, which is a totally underrated MMC character trope. I love a skater boy for obvious reasons. Her skateboarding terminology could have been better and sometimes took me out of it (not every ramp is a half pipe – I highly doubt he had an actual half pipe in his basement… mini ramp or just a plain ramp would have been fine!). Not bad when that is my only complaint though 😉
I swooned so much while reading – I genuinely felt giddy on almost every page. If I had just made the attempt early on, I absolutely would have finished in a sitting. I loved the setting (NY near CT), especially during the summer, and the cute small town of Beechwood. I predicted a lot of things but I’m really glad because it just meant that the character was destined to do what called to me as the reader… if that makes sense.
It’s clear that this author is a new auto-read for me and I’m definitely going to have to read NORA GOES OFF SCRIPT as soon as possible.
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