Poisoned Primrose (Motts Cold Case Mystery #1)
by Dahlia Donovan
My Rating: 3 stars
Genre: Cozy Mystery
Age Category: Adult
Type of romance: m/f
Blurb:
Meet Motts and the quirky cast of characters in her world. Poisoned Primrose is a quintessential cosy British mystery and an all-round fun story to throw yourself into.Autistic, asexual, and almost forty, Pineapple “Motts” Mottley flees London with her cat and turtle to a quaint cottage in Cornwall. She craves the peace of life in a small village. The dead body buried in her garden isn’t quite what she had in mind, though.
Unable to resist her curiosity, she falls directly into a mess of trouble and runs head-first into the attractive detective inspector, Teo Herceg. She tries to balance her business with the investigation, but as the killer focuses on her, staying alive becomes trickier than advanced origami.
Will Motts survive the onslaught of murderously bad luck?
Can she solve the mystery before it all spins out of control and off a cliff?
My Review
I really enjoyed two other series by this author and this year one of my goals was to start this series. As I already read two more recent series by this author what surprised me was how long this book was and I think the shorter length of the newer series works better. It felt like it was a longer book, but I didn’t feel much happened or as much progress was made in the mystery. Just like the other series I read by this author I enjoyed reading about the relatable autistic main character and liked the daily life scenes more than the mystery parts.
Poisoned Primrose is written from Motts point of view, she’s autistic and asexual. She just moved to a quaint cottage in Cornwall that used to belong to her aunt. This is the first time she’s living on her own and she starts making the cottage her own. She also has two pets a cat and a turtle. I liked reading about her and feeling at home in the new village and how much calmer it is than London. Although at times I struggled reading about her a bit as she could be so relatable and that was tough at times as I know exactly how disregulating surprise visits or crowded places could be. I liked the romance set up and how accepting he was of her, but I’ve read so many cozies with the detective as love interests that I prefer cozies that don’t have that. I liked seeing Motts interact with her friends and how they have her back and help her out.
While I like the daily life scenes about Motts life, I struggled with the mystery. It just didn’t grip me. There were multiple suspects and there’s some progress throughout the story, but it felt very slow going. And most of the time Motts got the courage to investigate someone screamed at her or attacked her and it just felt like everyone reacted the same to her questions. I also just wanted more details about the victim and who she was and what her life looked like and how the suspects fit in it, there is some of this, but it didn’t really was enough for me. And I just wasn’t invested in the mystery at all and it couldn’t keep my attention. I even had a hard time remembering who was who and there aren’t that many suspects. And Motts doesn’t really investigate or figure anything out, the police is actually competent in this book, which is great, but it doesn’t make for as engaging a story.
To summarize: This was a decent start to this new series. Having read some of the author’s newer series first I was surprised how long this one was and I think the shorter length of her newer series works better. I liked reading about Motts and how she settled into her new cottage. The daily life scenes were fun and I also liked the romance. Motts is autistic and she felt relatable. The mystery didn’t grip me as much, it just didn’t keep my attention and I felt like the progress was quite slow. The police are competent and I didn’t feel Motts efforts really added much to the investigation. It also bothered me how every suspects seemed to get upset and scream or attack Motts when she asked them questions. While I struggled a bit with this one I hope the next book in the series is a better fit for me.
That sounds pretty good.
It was, although I hope the next one is even better.
I adore the cover on this, but sounds like it was only so-so for you. But if you’ll go on in the series, that is still good! Thanks for sharing your thoughts!
I hope I’ll enjoy the next book more. I bought the whole series when it was discounted and have enjoyed the author’s other series so that gives me motivation to continue at least.