Title: A Murder Like No Author
Author: Amy Lillard
Series: Main Street Book Club Mystery #3
Publisher: Poisoned Pen Press
Release Date: November 30, 2021
Pages: 282
Book Source: Netgalley
“It’s movie time in Sugar Springs and the whole town is pitching together to get the historical Coliseum Theater ready for the event of the year—the premiere of Missing Girl, local author Wally Harrison’s bestselling novel turned film.
Thrilled to bring tourists to Sugar Springs, the town comes together to host the late author’s event. But when a stranger arrives, boasting he has definitive proof that Wally didn’t write Missing Girl…well, drama leaps from the page into real life. Mishaps start taking place around the theater—and then the stranger is discovered dead in his hotel room right before his press conference.
Can Arlo and her Friday night book club to sleuth out the killer and solve the mystery before the town’s Hollywood dreams go up in smoke?” – Amazon
Kim’s Review
A Murder Like No Author by Amy Lillard is the third book in the Main Street Book Club Mysteries, and I had hopes that this series would get better after reading book two, but this is my lowest rated one in the series. And the biggest reason comes down to me skimming a lot of the book because of Arlo continually trying to contain octogenarians and the sheriff being angry with her because she couldn’t… even though I don’t feel as if she should even be trying.
If Lillard would get rid of Arlo and let Fern, Camille, and Helen continue to be their fabulous selves that infuse humor into each book while solving the mystery, this series would be fantastic!
I do have to give Lillard kudos for being able to keep the theme of Wally and the “did he or didn’t he write the bestseller book” going through all three books. It is pretty ingenious how she is using this plot device to span the series…. That being said, if I read book four in the series, I hope that question gets answered and Lillard goes onto something else.
And I was also happy that Lillard introduced a character with a different lifestyle than many people have, and some cozy readers may even be aware of. But as much as I appreciated it, and hope to see more of this in other cozies, the way it was presented didn’t feel as fresh as it could have. Lillard did try to address this with the octogenarians not being PC about it, but even putting that nod towards it didn’t help.
As always, this is just my opinion. You may love this series, which always makes me happy when people enjoy a book. I will most likely try book four in the series, but if it keeps having the same problems, I’ll be reading other cozy mysteries since there are so many great ones out there.
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