Murder at Pirate's Cove: Secrets and Scrabble Book 1, Josh Lanyon

Just what I like in a cozy mystery and enough to bring me back for more.  Josh Lanyon seems to have a way with characters at times that makes me sink right into the story and their lives.  In any cozy mystery that I seem drawn to there's a hint of romance that hooks me and gives me hope of something strong, built through moments of crazy and something deeper that we get only pieces of until it all fits together like the clues in the mysteries they solve.

There were quite a lot of frustrating moments where all I wanted was for someone I could believe that believed in Ellery's innocence.  The ones we met that said they did were suspects in and of themselves.  I think it was a little far fetched to have everyone but Jack be a suspect though I will say that some of those people were quite likable anyway.  Something I didn't expect was to be a little surprised by the culprit, I mean, there were hints and looking back I can totally see who did it, but at the time I was just thinking that it was one more thing that was weird and didn't add up.

I'm really hoping that the Scrabble thing takes off and becomes something...kitsch? but in a good way, like the something unique that toes the whole series together beyond what Ellery and Jack could have and the quirkiness of Pirate's Cove.  Ellery is interesting and his looking for a place in the town and in his own life served as fantastic draws to him as a character.  We only get his perspective, though I hope to have a chance to see into Jack's mind and heart at some point, and since the series follows Ellery it's understandable, I'm just a bigger fan of a dual POV in general.

The story was simple and formulaic, but I'd argue that it's in the best way because the format is one we're familiar with so we don't have to guess at the foundations, we can jump right into what makes these people, this mystery, this potential relationship unique and worth devouring.  While I can't say I was ravenous for the story, I was definitely hungry for more by the end.

$3.99 on Amazon

Ellery Page, aspiring screenwriter, Scrabble champion and guy-with-worst-luck-in-the-world-when-it-comes-to-dating, is ready to make a change. So when he learns he's inherited both a failing bookstore and a falling-down mansion in the quaint seaside village of Pirate's Cove on Buck Island, Rhode Island, it's full steam ahead!

Sure enough, the village is charming, its residents amusingly eccentric, and widowed police chief Jack Carson is decidedly yummy (though probably as straight as he is stern). However, the bookstore is failing, the mansion is falling down, and there's that little drawback of finding rival bookseller--and head of the unwelcoming-committee--Trevor Maples dead during the annual Buccaneer Days celebration.

Still, it could be worse. And once Police Chief Carson learns Trevor was killed with the cutlass hanging over the door of Ellery's bookstore, it is.