A Body at the Irish Book Club by Lucy Connelley
A Body at the Irish Book Club (Mercy McCarthy Book 5) by Lucy Connelley
This was my third book of Lucy Connelley’s and I’ve read all of them in just a few weeks as I’m enjoying the lighthearted, cozy mysteries she writes as well as the characters. Connelley is also a very quick writer as she just had another book come out with a different FMC which will be a different series. You can find my review for that one here; “The Curious Case of the Poisoned Professor”.
I read the first book in this series,“An Irish Bookshop Murder” focused on the female main character, Mercy McCarthy, who moves to Ireland with her sister to take over their grandfather’s house and bookshop. I then jumped to this fifth installment of the series after receiving an arc close to the publication day. I was a bit nervous that I would have missed too much from not reading three books, but I was surprised that I was only confused with one situation. Other than that, it seems the series is going to be very very slow in the plot development as well as a slow burn romance.
The timeline in Mercy’s life is only about five months or so from the first book to this fifth book. I didn’t mind that so much since I hadn’t missed anything, but I could see this being a bit frustrating to readers going through the whole series. Also, a bit crazy that a small town that never had any issues or murder suddenly has over five murders (at least one per book) in just five months!
Of course, this is definitely a very tall tale type mystery since Mercy is an amateur sleuth and not an actual detective. She writes bestselling mysteries and from her research and stories, she seems to be able to solve the crimes when the true detectives cannot. I’m always a sucker for these stories even if at times I know it is very unlikely but it’s fun to see Mercy trying to snoop in a way that doesn’t truly seem like snooping or hindering the detective’s investigation. In this book, you can see that Kieran, the detective, is definitely starting to embrace Mercy’s help more even though he still warns her to stay away for safety.
Overall, this book kept me entertained and interested and I’m curious to see what else happens with Mercy and this small town.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with an arc of this book.
Synopsis: Mercy McCarthy is delighted to see old neighbors and new friends come to the bookstore to support her sister’s autumn book club. But as Mercy closes the chapter on the evening, she stumbles across local grandmother Eva, lifelessly slumped in a squashy armchair at the back of the store.
She recognizes Eva as one of the festival’s main organizers and though she looks to be at peace, the plot thickens when Mercy notices a suspicious mark on her neck. She knows this was no accident. With so many people in the store that night, any one of them could be the killer.
Just as Mercy reads a suspicious-sounding entry for the festival’s fiction-writing contest, another body turns up on the beach. Is someone in Shamrock Cove dying for a bestseller?
It’s up to Mercy and her crime-solving canine companion Mr. Poe to sniff out the suspects before another victim is taken. Could the murderer be the garden center owner who dabbles in chemistry? Eva’s ne’er-do-well grandson-in-law? Or the local busybody who has an opinion about everybody?
Mercy has to hit the books—and the streets of Shamrock Cove—to solve the mystery before the killer has the last word.