Scan barcode
A review by abaranes
Murder is a Piece of Cake by Valerie Burns
3.0
2.5.
I'm actually quite disappointed in this one, especially with how much I enjoyed the first one. It felt like a lot of the characterization that was built up well in the first book turned into a bit of flanderization. The mystery element, too, was fairly straightforward and fairly easy to solve - unless there's a major twist that is being held for a later book. The way the book concludes almost feels like Burns got bored writing this one and wanted to wrap it up so she could get to the next book in the series.
I think there's a larger issue I'm having with this series, which is the author seems to be trying to build a much larger mystery - one that is solved over the course of several novels, rather than just one. It's leaving me feel kind of incomplete when I finish the individual books in the series. For example, the first book solved one murder, but left quite a few questions that went unanswered. However, rather than answer some those questions in this book, Burns ignores quite a few of them and instead introduces new questions - questions that also remain unanswered at the end. It feels like Burns is trying to write this series like a serial TV show in which there is a case of the week (that gets solved), but also a longer, more complicated mystery at hand. Unfortunately, I'm not sure that blend works quite as well with books that are released several months apart, compared to weekly episodes. It might work if the larger mystery were less important or if the "case of the week" were smaller, but right now it feels like the mix isn't quite right.
I'm actually quite disappointed in this one, especially with how much I enjoyed the first one. It felt like a lot of the characterization that was built up well in the first book turned into a bit of flanderization. The mystery element, too, was fairly straightforward and fairly easy to solve - unless there's a major twist that is being held for a later book. The way the book concludes almost feels like Burns got bored writing this one and wanted to wrap it up so she could get to the next book in the series.
I think there's a larger issue I'm having with this series, which is the author seems to be trying to build a much larger mystery - one that is solved over the course of several novels, rather than just one. It's leaving me feel kind of incomplete when I finish the individual books in the series. For example, the first book solved one murder, but left quite a few questions that went unanswered. However, rather than answer some those questions in this book, Burns ignores quite a few of them and instead introduces new questions - questions that also remain unanswered at the end. It feels like Burns is trying to write this series like a serial TV show in which there is a case of the week (that gets solved), but also a longer, more complicated mystery at hand. Unfortunately, I'm not sure that blend works quite as well with books that are released several months apart, compared to weekly episodes. It might work if the larger mystery were less important or if the "case of the week" were smaller, but right now it feels like the mix isn't quite right.