A thoroughly enjoyable tongue in cheek little book with great illustrations. I laughed a lot when reading this little gem. A must have for any cozy mystery lover.

Loved it. This cute little book was funny, entertaining, and so smart. If you enjoy the murder mystery genre a la Miss Marple, Jessica Fletcher, et al style, you will get a total kick out of this one!

This book is a perfect gift for someone who is really into watching British mystery shows on PBS, BritBox or AcornTV, or reading cozy mysteries and who is obsessed with England as a result, who is planning a trip to an English murder village.. One can never be too careful! The book is a humorous how-to guide, detailing the people, places, and activities which should be avoided. It has beautiful illustrations, too! It certainly isn't meant for any sort of actual story or characters, just descriptions.

Thank you, NetGalley, for the chance to read and review this book. All the opinions expressed are mine, and given freely.

I’ve bought this book as a gift several times over, just because I had to share this weirdness and delightful dark humor with others. Maureen Johnson knows and loves mysteries, and this book shows just how much and with what fondness.

I picked this up because I like a good British mystery here or there. In addition, I've been binge watching Midsomer Murders now and then, which is a series about a police detective solving murders in the quaint English villages of Midsomer County. So this book was right up the alley.

The book opens with a note to the gentle reader. Then it looks at the two major locations: the village and the manor. Within the locations, the authors guide us through places, people, and event in both locations. To reinforce the guidance, you get a quiz at the end of each section. Your odds of passing the quizzes are slim. Remember, these villages really are murder central. You should have stayed in the city.

The entries are brief, so this book is more like a glossary than a full guide. However, its entries capture the essence of a quaint English village. The book plays well on the cozy village mystery tropes and stereotypes. If you are fan of the genre, you will recognize the various elements and smile a bit.

For me, this was a light, fun, and amusing read. It does not have much substance, but it has good humor. The art, reminiscent of works like Masterpiece Theater, suits the text well. The book can be a good selection for public libraries, just shelve it next to the cozy British mysteries.

Overall I liked this one.

Quirky, Fun And Frivolous…
Fancy a trip to a quaint English village? You know, full of delightful chocolate box cottages and meandering cobbles. Think again. They may also be full of murderous intent. This delightful little tome will help you along the way and perhaps avoid a murder or two. Quirky, fun and frivolous.

This is a delightful little primer on how to survive if you find yourself in the landscape of a typical Agatha Christie-esque murder mystery. The illustrations are appropriate and funny, and the advice is logical, if a bit fatalistic.

I especially enjoyed the quizzes at the end of each section, and the answer explanations.

This would make a perfect gift for anyone you know who likes a cozy murder mystery, or perhaps anyone traveling to the various cute little villages you might find on a weekend holiday in the UK.

A quick read for mystery lovers that provides tips in a very humorous, tongue in cheek manner. It helps if you are familiar with British mysteries but not a requirement to enjoy this guide. I look forward to more guides from these authors.

This appeals greatly to my British-murder-mystery loving heart. I was impressed that Maureen Johnson managed to cycle through the plots of every standard episode of Miss Marple, Father Brown, and Midsomer Murders in such a short book.

If you’re a lover of this particular kind of British cozy-adjacent mystery, this is a really fun read, accompanied by illustrations equal parts ominous and adorable.

This book is so hard to describe without spoiling it for others. It’s a quick read. Part travel guide, part guide to not getting murdered.

Delighted to include this title in Crimes & Misdemeanours, the true crime and mystery list in my thematic seasonal holiday gift books guides for Zoomer magazine. It appeared in the Books section in December. (The listicle is online at related link.)

Absolutely brilliant. From the highly entertaining (and pointed - ha ha, read it and you'll get the joke) writing and the delightful illustrations, this book is a little gem that would amuse even the most heinous of quaint village/manor denizens. If I were to add a few quotes of the funniest bits, I would have to transcribe at least half of the book, but let me just say "Stairs: the xylophones of death" and "Walls: the most interesting things happen inside them", and you don't want to know about the orphans... Johnson and Cooper manage to cover most of the tropes of every English whodunnit of the Golden Age of crime, and every spoof that has since been engendered, and still make this fresh and side-splittingly hilarious. It is the kind of book that will have you tugging at colleagues, family members or possibly total strangers on public transport, just to show them sentences or pictures that tickle your funnybone. So, yes, ironically, it may in fact lead to your getting murdered somewhere other than in a quaint English village!
My grateful thanks to Netgalley for the ARC, and I'll be re-reading a couple of more times in the next few weeks!

This book didn't work for me. Maybe I don't watch enough British crime dramas but to me it just felt like a bit that went on too long. It would have been entertaining as a daily webcomic but in the format of an entire book it just seemed to be the same joke for too long.

A delightful illustrated book that pokes gentle fun at everyone's favourite English cozy mysteries tropes.I really enjoyed it and think it would make an excellent gift for any reader who loves Agatha Christie-type novels or TV series like Midsomer Murders.

Are you in the mood for a cross between a season of Midsomer Murders and a collection of Edward Gorey illustrations? Excellent news! That’s what you’ll find here. This is a brief but hilarious book, a perfect gift for fans of British mysteries, as long as they possess a good sense of humor.

This is a fun little guide, I was expecting more of a story, but that's on me not the book. I liked the pictures that went along with each description of how not to get murdered

This was an absolute delight! Cozy murder mysteries are one of my favorites, both on-screen and in books. So this book spoke to my soul. It's a quick read, just a little over a hundred pages long. Said pages aren't even full pages, just little pieces of humor for each little section. However, it was so much fun. I laughed out loud through a lot of the book. It calls out the classic tropes and pokes fun at them.

The book as a whole was well put together in my opinion. I love that it was split up into sections: the Town, the Manor, the People. Because apparently for such a small village there are a lot of ways to die and so many tie back to the Vicar and the church. So it was nice the book was split up, gave it a nice flow from one section to the next one.

For me, I loved this book was also illustrated. I thought it added to the fun to get to see what the village and manor looked like. To have a visual of the characters you learned how they'd kill you, or how they were going to be killed. I loved the little splash of reading that drew your way to different parts of the illustrations.

All of it came together in an Ed Gorey kind of fashion that I adored. While I'm sad I put this book off so long because it was a fun read, and glad it was put in my path again. Thank goodness books don't expire! This is a book I could see myself going back to read again to pull myself out of a reading slump. It's also a book I would give as a gift to other reader friends who also love cozy mysteries!

I loved this short and hilarious book. The book describes the dos and don’ts of visiting a village from a British murder mystery. Very similar to Lemony Snicket's writing style because it is so quick-witted and hilarious. I came for Maureen Johnson, left with a new goal to go to a small European town and discover a juicy scandal that inevitably led to my demise. Or maybe i’ll play it safe and just read an Agatha Christie novel.

This one was a really short read, but also a very humorous one. You can really see where it takes inspiration from classic crime novels and English murder lore. The artwork is almost grotesque and added so much to the story. I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who is looking for a short and funny read.

An enjoyable tongue-in-cheek Edward Gorey-esque illustrated guide to, well, not getting murdered in a Gosford Park/Downton Abbey/Hot Fuzz-y style English village.