4 out of 5 stars
Today, I’m happy to bring you the latest stop in the Great Escapes Virtual Book Tour for Bearly Departed, the first book in the new Shamelessly Adorable Teddy Bear Mystery series by Meg Macy. It was a fun read and a good start to the new series!
Purchase Links: Amazon – B&N – Kobo
Synopsis
As manager of the family teddy bear shop and factory, thirty-one-year-old Sasha Silverman leads a charmed life. Well, except for the part about being a single divorcée with a ticking biological clock in small-town Silver Hollow. And that’s just kid’s stuff compared to Will Taylor, the sales rep who’s set on making drastic changes to the business her parents built from scratch—with or without Sasha’s approval . . .
But before Will digs his claws in, someone pulls the stuffing out of his plan . . . and leaves his dead body inside the factory. Reeling from shock, Sasha’s hit with more bad news—police suspect her hot-tempered Uncle Ross may have murdered him. Sasha knows her uncle would never do such a thing, and she’s launching her own little investigation to expose the truth. As she tracks Will’s biggest rivals and enemies for clues, Sasha can’t get too comfy—or she’ll become the next plaything for a killer . . .
Review
While I felt that there was a bit of a slow start to the book, once I got into it, this was a fun and delightful read; a great start to a new series!
I like our main characters. For the most part, Sasha has a sensible head on her shoulders. Right at the end, she seemed to lose that sensibility and put herself in real danger, but that was the first time in the whole book she’d done that so I think I’m really going to end up liking her as a character.
Since I live in SE Michigan, I’m very familiar with the area that Ms. Macy used in the book. You could tell that she combined some towns to make the area, but if you weren’t from this area, it’d seem like a really nice little town. Being from here didn’t detract from the story line. I don’t mean that. It was kind of neat to see the things that she included and what she mixed around for originality, that kind of thing. 🙂
The plot line moved along at a steady pace. As I said above, I had a bit of a slow start getting into it, but once I did, I enjoyed it. I wondered about the villain, but I didn’t get the whole picture until the end when it was revealed.
I’d definitely recommend this new series and I look forward to the next one, even tho’ we have to wait until next June for it!
*** Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an ARC. I was not compensated for my review. All opinions and conclusions are my own. ***
About the Author
Award-winning mystery author Meg Macy lives in Southeast Michigan, close to Ann Arbor, Chelsea, and Dexter — the area she chose for the setting of her new “Shamelessly Adorable Teddy Bear” cozy mystery series for Kensington. She is also one-half of the writing team of D.E. Ireland for the Eliza Doolittle & Henry Higgins Mystery series; two books have been named Agatha Award finalists. Meg’s first published book, Double Crossing, won the 2012 Best First Novel Spur Award from Western Writers of America. She’s a graduate of Seton Hill University’s Writing Popular Fiction program. Meg loves reading mysteries, historicals, and other genre fiction, and also enjoys gardening, crafts, and watercolor painting.
Author Links
www.megmacy.com
Meg Macy – Teddy Bear Cozy Mysteries
Meg Macy on Twitter
Thanks for joining me today! Click on the banner below to take you to the main tour page and a listing of all the other stops on the tour!
, Scrapbook Mysteries
, and Cackleberry Club Mysteries
. In her previous life she was CEO/Creative Director of her own marketing firm and authored several screenplays. She is married to a professor of Chinese art history, loves to travel, rides horses, enjoys fund-raising for various non-profits, and has two Chinese Shar-Pei dogs.
– set in the historic district of Charleston and featuring Theodosia Browning, owner of the Indigo Tea Shop. Theodosia is a savvy entrepreneur, and pet mom to service dog Earl Grey. She’s also an intelligent, focused amateur sleuth who doesn’t rely on coincidences or inept police work to solve crimes. This charming series is highly atmospheric and rife with the history and mystery that is Charleston.
– a slightly edgier series that take place in New Orleans. The main character, Carmela, owns Memory Mine scrapbooking shop in the French Quarter and is forever getting into trouble with her friend, Ava, who owns the Juju Voodoo shop. New Orleans’ spooky above-ground cemeteries, jazz clubs, bayous, and Mardi Gras madness make their presence known here!
– set in Kindred, a fictional town in the Midwest. In a rehabbed Spur station, Suzanne, Toni, and Petra, three semi-desperate, forty-plus women have launched the Cackleberry Club. Eggs are the morning specialty here and this cozy cafe even offers a book nook and yarn shop. Business is good but murder could lead to the cafe’s undoing! This series offers recipes, knitting, cake decorating, and a dash of spirituality.
Valerie's Musings 