Posies and Poisons (Sweetfern Harbor, #1) by Wendy Meadows

Posies and Poison by Wendy Meadows
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

When Brenda Sheffield inherits a bed and breakfast from her uncle, she packs up her life as an assistant to a private investigator in Michigan and relocates to the charming small town of Sweetfern Harbor. As is the way, the residents there know everyone and everyone’s business but, for the most part, all get along very well. There is an exception though, and in this case, it is the local grande dame and largest property owner, Priscilla Pendleton. Soon after Brenda arrives, the town gets into an uproar because “Lady” Pendleton has announced another rent increase and is really putting the squeeze on the small, local business owners. When Lady Pendleton suddenly ends up dead and everyone in town has a motive to get rid of her, the local police detective asks Brenda to help him work through the long list of suspects.

Posies and Poisons is a short and quick introduction to the Sweetfern Harbor cozy mystery series by Wendy Meadows. The author has created a quaint setting in the small seaside town, one every reader will want to visit, if it were possible, with a variety of interesting characters to populate it. The main character Brenda Sheffield is calm and canny and very observant of her fellow residents. This amateur sleuth did not do anything out of the ordinary or put herself in harm’s way as most do, and that was a nice change. She was smart, sensible, capable, and likable. The police detective on the case, Mac Rivers, seemed less so. Likable, yes, and definitely a candidate as a romantic interest for Brenda but he seemed to jump from suspect to suspect too quickly.

The Audible edition of the book was easy listening and didn’t require strict attention to detail. It was fun. The narrator, in this case, had a pleasant enough voice however her delivery was rife with odd pauses which were very distracting from the story itself. I slipped into my Kindle edition of this book and found it a much better reading experience than this audio version.

I recommend this book for cozy mystery readers especially those that like those small-town stories.

I voluntarily reviewed this after receiving a free copy.


View all my reviews