I am so delighted today to provide a review for you at my blog stop for A Midwinter’s Tail by Bethany Blake on the Great Escapes Virtual Book Tour.
A Midwinter’s Tail (Lucky Paws Petsitting Mystery)
Cozy Mystery
4th in Series
Kensington (November 27, 2018)
Mass Market Paperback: 304 pages
ISBN-10: 1496717333
ISBN-13: 978-1496717337
Digital ASIN: B07B7C8XQY
To bark or not to bark . . .
Professional pet sitter Daphne Templeton loves the holidays in Sylvan Creek, Pennsylvania. And nothing gets her into the spirit more than the town’s annual Bark the Halls Ball. The whole community will be there to wag their tails, especially this year’s special guest—Celeste “CeeCee” French, founder of a national chain of pet care franchises, who’s returning home to announce plans for a bright new flagship store.
But not everyone’s celebrating CeeCee’s homecoming. Daphne’s friend Moxie Bloom, owner of Spa and Paw, a unique salon for people and their pets, has plenty to growl about. So when CeeCee is found face down under Sylvan Creek’s town Christmas tree, stabbed with a distinctive pair of professional-grade pet shears, suspicion lands squarely on Moxie. Despite Daphne’s promises to Detective Jonathan Black, she quickly reprises her role as amateur sleuth. Ably assisted by her basset hound sidekick, Socrates, she must hurry to prove her friend’s innocence before a killer barks again . . .
Includes recipes for homemade pet treats!
It’s Christmas time in beautiful Sylvan Creek, Pennsylvania and pet sitter Daphne Templeton is gearing up by providing lots and lots of treats for the community yearly event Bark the Halls Ball. She will be taking her basset hound Socrates and accompanied by BFF Moxie and possible romantic interest Detective Jonathan Black. It is a very pet-friendly town and she is a proud owner of storefront Lucky Paws Pet Sitting Service and Flour Power. She also has a surly black Persian named Tinkleston, whom she calls Tink.
At the annual showing of “It’s a Wonderful Life,” a successful local graduate, CeeCee French, comes back to town to make the announcement that she will open a large outlet of her pet supply franchise in town. The announcement is shocking and not met with a lot of excitement and she is later found murdered and left under the town Christmas tree. As the owner of the Spa and Paw, it is Moxie who is the first person of interest and as the well-plotted and even paced story is laid out, several others later as well all with equally plausible motives.
This is an amazingly well projected anthropomorphic narrative with Daphne frequently speaking to her animals and their obvious telegraphed responses. I’ve often looked at my own Bichon Frise and thought I knew looking into those eyes just what she was thinking and sure I knew her response as well. We’ve often commented, she may not speak English, but she certainly has no problem communicating. In this case, Daphne certainly had a dog whispering touch with those animals left in her care.
I enjoyed the well-developed characters and although this is apparently the fourth in the series had no problem following the protagonist or the support characters. Also noted the many cliffhanging chapter endings, necessitating the reader jump to the next chapter. I did, however, have a small problem with Moxie and Sebastian, her white rat allowed a bit too much freedom. Additionally, I am not usually a fan of romantic tension in a well-executed mystery.
I received this ebook download from the publisher and NetGalley for a book tour and greatly appreciated the opportunity to read and review what appears to be a delightful cozy mystery series with some engaging characters. Recommended for the younger set who enjoy a cozy mystery they’ll have to work to solve and then may not guess correctly.
Bethany Blake lives in a small, quaint town in Pennsylvania with her husband and three daughters. When she’s not writing or riding horses, she’s wrangling a menagerie of furry family members that includes a nervous pit bull, a fearsome feline, a blind goldfish, and an attack cardinal named Robert. Like Daphne Templeton, the heroine of her Lucky Paws Mysteries, Bethany holds a Ph.D. and operates a pet sitting business called Barkley’s Premium Pet Care.
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Thank you for visiting my stop on the tour and please visit the other stops listed below!
Tour Participants
November 26 – Island Confidential – SPOTLIGHT
November 26 – Reading Is My SuperPower – REVIEW, GIVEAWAY
November 26 – A Wytch’s Book Review Blog – CHARACTER INTERVIEW
November 27 – Here’s How It Happened – CHARACTER GUEST POST
November 27 – Brooke Blogs – SPOTLIGHT, GIVEAWAY
November 27 – Cozy Up With Kathy – GUEST POST
November 28 – A Blue Million Books – AUTHOR INTERVIEW
November 28 – The Power of Words – REVIEW, GIVEAWAY
November 29 – Laura’s Interests – REVIEW
November 29 – Mystery Thrillers and Romantic Suspense Reviews – SPOTLIGHT
November 29 – View from the Birdhouse – REVIEW
November 30 – StoreyBook Reviews – GUEST POST
November 30 – Babs Book Bistro – SPOTLIGHT, RECIPE, GIVEAWAY
November 30 – MJB Reviewers – REVIEW, AUTHOR INTERVIEW, GIVEAWAY
December 1 – My Devotional Thoughts – REVIEW
December 1 – Books a Plenty Book Reviews – REVIEW
December 2 – Rosepoint Publishing – REVIEW
December 2 – Readeropolis – SPOTLIGHT, RECIPE
December 3 – Carla Loves to Read – REVIEW
December 3 – A Holland Reads – CHARACTER GUEST POST
December 4 – I’m All About Books – SPOTLIGHT
December 4 – The Cozy Pages – REVIEW
December 4 – The Pulp and Mystery Shelf – GUEST POST
December 4 – Mysteries with Character – AUTHOR INTERVIEW
December 5 – Melina’ Book Blog – REVIEW
December 5 – My Reading Journeys – REVIEW, CHARACTER GUEST POST
December 5 – Sneaky the Library Cat’s Blog – CHARACTER INTERVIEW 
Thanks to Great Escapes Virtual Book Tours for the opportunity to read and review this cozy mystery!
©2018 V Williams 
What a delightfully different premise for a cozy mystery! A house flipper–and a female at that–and I can testify to having been involved in that activity and confronted just exactly the scenario described in walking through the house shortly after closing the auction. It has “good bones” and they will be only be doing cosmetic work. This is the home of the former fiancé of her Aunt Lynda, who disappeared before she and Cal married, never to be heard from again. Devastated, he never married.
Judi Lynn received a Master’s Degree from Indiana University as an elementary school teacher after attending the IPFW campus. She taught 1st, 2nd, and 4th grades for six years before having her two daughters. She loves gardening, cooking and trying new recipes.
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The Author: 
Title: Zephyr by Andrew Cooke
Now my son has taken up the torch and has found some amazing connections! First, I can say one of us may have come over on the original three ships–if not the Nina, Pinta, or Santa Maria, one very soon after and was then in both the Revolutionary War and the Civil War (some interesting history there as well). The grandmother I remember on my dad’s side was born on the Chippewa Reservation of the Cherokee Reservation of OK (Oklahoma) in Indian Territory. It was her husband, William (left), that is our link to early America.
The grandmother on my mother’s side was 100% Swedish (standing on the left), first generation to be born in America. Anders’ sons have been traced back to Sweden, the family living approximately six miles from the North Sea. She had beautiful red hair and along with my husband’s father’s red hair contributed to my grandson’s red hair.
Rosepoint Publishing 