Book Review: Something Read, Something Dead by Eva Gates

Cover from Amazon

Something Read, Something Dead has a very enjoyable main character and a great voice. I got sucked into it immediately with total suspension of disbelief. Because the characters and the family drama was so compelling, I was well into the book before I realized the death technically came in late for the genre. It's easy to instead get swept up into the characters and their conflicts because it's well-written overall and with excellent depth on even the side characters.

I easily could have been reading book one except for references to previous investigations. This is such a relief after having recently read others where I felt left out and characters were flat.

However, the story did overall seem to focus more on everything else and less on the mystery. I had figured out several key aspects of the murder case early on, so it felt like she was slow putting the pieces together. But with characters like this I didn't really mind.

If you go into the book without genre expectations and let yourself go along for the ride, you'll have a better experience. Because of those expectations, I am only comfortable giving a high 3.5 to low 4 star review. Your rating will also be much higher if you're already invested in these characters.

I will be looking for more from this author and even from the series. Definitely worth the read and better than average despite my concerns.

Note: I chose to download this book from NetGalley for review purposes.