Review: Murder Past Due by Miranda James

Murder Past Due (Cat in the Stacks #1)
by Miranda James
narrated by Erin Bennett

My Rating: 4 stars

Genre: Cozy Mystery
Age Category: Adult
Type of romance: m/f

Blurb:
Everyone in Athena, Mississippi, knows Charlie Harris, the good-natured librarian with a rescued Maine coon cat named Diesel that he walks on a leash. He’s returned to his hometown to immerse himself in books, but soon enough he’s entangled in a real-life thriller…

A famous author of gory bestsellers and a former classmate of Charlie’s, Godfrey Priest may be the pride of Athena, but Charlie remembers him as an arrogant, manipulative jerk—and he’s not the only one. Godfrey’s homecoming as a distinguished alumnus couldn’t possibly go worse: by lunch, he’s put a man in the hospital. By dinner, Godfrey’s dead.

Now it’s up to Charlie, with some help from Diesel, to paw through the town’s grudges and find the killer before an impatient deputy throws the book at the wrong person. But every last one of Charlie’s friends and co-workers had a score to settle with the nasty novelist. As if the murder wasn’t already purr-plexing enough…

My Review

I received a free audio copy from Tantor Audio and voluntarily reviewed it.

Cozy mysteries are one of my favorite genres for audiobooks, so when I heard of this series I was excited to give it a try. It took me a bit to get into the book, but it eventually won me over with the really well written and engaging murder mystery.

The mystery in this book was really the highlight for me. It was so good! There were plenty of suspects who all had motive and more popping up as the story progresses. The mystery had enough progression throughout with new facts coming to light and more information about the victim and those he knew. There were so many twists and turns as well as reveals throughout and it made for a very exciting mystery. It kept me guessing and engaged. I kept thinking I figured it out and then changing my mind and toward the end I finally managed to guess it right before the reveal, which was satisfying. The wrap up and reveal were well done, the murderer had a solid motive and it all made sense and fell on it’s place.

I felt the daily life parts of this book were less engaging than the mystery parts, but luckily most of the focus was on the mystery. It took some time to get to know the main character and I assume the daily life scenes might be more enjoyable in future books. I thought it was interesting to have a male main character as I mostly read cozies with female main characters. It made sense why he got involved in the mystery which is something I like, but I didn’t like how he kept so much evidence form the detective although it was good he realized his mistakes. I liked how he worked as an archivist and volunteer librarian as well as opening his house for college student boarders. I felt this gave lots of ties with the community and ways to get involved in the mystery as well as plenty of potential for future books. I liked Charlie’s cat Diesel who goes almost everywhere with Charlie and it was fun to read about him.

The narrator was new to me, but I enjoyed her style. It was a bit confused at first to have a female narrator while the main character was male and I thought at first the main character was female because of it. I quickly got used to it and I liked the narrator. Her voice could go low enough to fit the male voices and her female voices were well done too.

To summarize: This was a great start to this series. It took me some time to get into the book, but the well written mystery won me over. I really enjoyed the mystery in this book. It was really engaging with plenty of twists and turns and exciting reveals. It kept me guessing and I managed to figure out who the murderer was slightly before the reveal, which was satisfying. The mystery was definitely the highlight of the book for me, the daily life scenes were a bit less interesting to me, but luckily most of the focus is on the mystery. The narrator was good and I liked the different voices she did for the characters. Definitely a good start to the series and I look forward to continuing the series.

Links:
– Goodreads
– Bookbub
– Amazon
– Audible
– B&N
– Kobo

You can also read my review on Goodreads and Bookbub.