reddhead16 's review for:

A Most Puzzling Murder by Bianca Marais

4.0

mysterious

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I think a physical copy of this book would be great for the puzzle solving and choose your own conundrum type chapters. However it does not translate well to audiobook version as usually when I listen to an audiobook it is while I am doing other activities and not able to sit down and solve the puzzles that pop up quite frequently, so I am left out and it makes the book more convoluted (since then I can't find out who Destiny mistrusts, names, secrets, and all the answers to the puzzles reveal) with the multiple characters and their different views as well as jumping through time back and forth between the past and the present with Destiny heading off to the island to find out the truth about her family and ending up in the middle of a sorcerers war for who will be the heir to all the power. I think I would have enjoyed the story a lot more without the puzzles because I will say, that the Scruffmore's have one messed up family tree and I ended up chuckling each time the increasing frustrated genealogist had to update it. And once I got into the story, with the different family members, their plots to get the power, revenge, or just find out the truth of what happened long ago with Bramble, the serial killer murders, and who Destiny's family is.  I still thought it was a bit too long and drawn out because I would think almost everything had been explained and then you have a raccoon mixing it all up again!

The story is 4 stars, puzzles 2 stars, Narrator gets 5 stars because of the good job done bringing so many characters and twisty turns on a very strange island to life. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the chance to listen to this book which ended better than it started though I really hated the cha-ching of puzzle time, right when the story got interesting.