The fact that I finished reading this book without my eyes rolling out of my head just shows that I’m stronger than I think I am.

Listen, I get it. It’s a cozy mystery--the gore happens off the page and there are cheesy one-liners around every corner. And sure, that’s not my genre of choice but I like to think of myself as someone who can appreciate most genres but boy howdy cozy mysteries just hit different.

If Tess compared Sheriff Boyd with her fiction character one more time, I couldn’t be held responsible. Her whole character gave me the ick. If you find a detached limb in the pond that is literally a stone’s throw away from your house... LEAVE. Oh, you got a child with you? LEAVE QUICKLY. What are you doing? You write murder mysteries, not an actual police person. If the sheriff told me that I should leave, I’d be gone.

For real, I wanted to punch Tess in the face.

The twist at the end was something I didn’t see coming.

But the complaints really stop there.

I’m sure there is an audience for this series. It’s just not me. Will I pick up another cozy mystery? Sure! Will I complain about it the whole time? Most likely. But sometimes you need that. A fluffy, nonsense read that you can pick up, consume, and then never think about again. And that’s what this book was for me.