Ellie Christie is thrilled to begin a new chapter. She’s recently returned to her tiny Colorado hometown to run her family’s historic bookshop with her elder sister, Meg, and their friendly bookshop cat, Agatha. The Book Chalet is perched in a mountain-top town, accessible b ski gondola. When a mysterious stranger is found dead on the gondola, the Christie sisters spring into action! They summon their inner Miss Marple's in order to solve the mystery that has even the police baffled.
Cute, cozy mystery. Should be read in front of a roaring fire, preferably while it is snowing outside.

*Special thanks to NetGalley and Bantam for this e-arc.*

3.7 Stars
One Liner: Uneven pacing and a bit silly but entertaining

Ellie Christie is back home in her tiny Colorado town to run the family bookshop with her older sister, Meg. Her sister’s teen Rosie and their fun-loving Gram help them in the business. The bookshop cat, Agatha C. Christie, does her bit to spread her hair around the books and bring more customers with her haughty frown.
The bookshop, Book Chalet, is a favorite destination for booklovers in the town. However, the appearance of a mysterious stranger disrupts their book club meeting. When the man later ends up dead and has a history related to the town, the list of suspects starts to grow.
The Christie family goes on an unsubtle amateur sleuthing as the snow piles high around the town. When a close family friend ends up as the prime suspect, Ellie and Meg have to sharpen their Marpling skills and find the killer. Can they do it in time and prevent more disasters in their cozy little town?
The story comes in the first-person POV by Ellie Christie.

My Thoughts:
The book is set in a snowy fictional town in Colorado. The small-town setting is spot on, with an array of characters and even a celebrity thrown into the mix.
As the characters’ names suggest, there’s a lot of Christie in the book. As a fan, I did enjoy it, especially the regal cat.
The story is quite lighthearted and humorous. If you want something silly and goofy with murder, this is your pick.
The family dynamics are sweet, like really sweet. The teen is well-behaved and has enough skills to survive just about anywhere. Gram is tech-savvy enough to send voice messages (so what if the message ends up different from what she intended).
My major grouse is with the pacing. It starts well, dips, slows, picks up a little, dips again, and ends with a moderate pace. Tighter editing would have solved the issue. I wouldn’t mind editing the repeated references to reading, either. I already know that they are bibliophiles. No point in reminding me multiple times throughout the book.
Absent in the Spring by Christie (written as Mary Westmacott) has a key role in the story. I like how it’s incorporated into the plot.
The murder and a few reveals were easy to guess (something I don’t mind in cozies). As the first book in the series, this one sets a decent base for the upcoming murders… books. I’d like more details about the main characters’ lives and a little less about how much they love to read.

To summarize, Dead and Gondola is an entertaining read but a slightly bumpy ride. That said, I’m looking forward to the next in the series.
Thank you, NetGalley, Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine, and Bantam, for the eARC. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the book.

Dead and Gondola is Ann Claire's first book in the series. Ellie has just returned to Colorado and is excited to run the family bookstore with her sister Meg along with Agatha the cat. The Book Chalet is reachable by gondola or a twisty mountain road. During a whiteout and a rockslide, a man is found dead on the gondola. He was a stranger who had visited the bookstore. After it's found who the mysterious man is, the Christies close friends are suspects. Ellie and Meg decide to investigate the crime to clear their friends.

This is a fun first book. I love that it is set in a bookstore. This is a great book if you are a reader of cozy mysteries or just light mysteries. The characters are well developed. Such a cute little egg to name the cat Agatha and the sisters Christie. Definitely will be reading the next book in the series.

This is a brand new cozy mystery series! I loved the Christie sisters and their dynamic, the mystery was interesting and the storyline was all together entertaining. I will happily read the next in the series as soon as it becomes available!

What's it about (in a nutshell):
Dead and Gondola by Ann Claire is the start of a delightful new cozy series featuring the Christie sisters and their wonderful cat, Agatha.
Initial Expectations (before beginning the book):
So many things have excited me to read this new series: it's set around a bookstore, there's a cat named Agatha Christie, and it's about sisters - Ellie and Meg. I love family themes, and it seems like any story featuring sisters will have to have some strong family themes. Plus, a cat named Agatha Christy…well, my heart swoons.
Actual Reading Experience:
I loved all the Agatha Christie references – from her personal life to her mysteries and lead characters. They are all used at various times to describe what is happening in the mysteries as a comparison. You may notice that I said mysteries plural – yes, there is more than one mystery. Someone is murdered, someone goes missing, something is stolen, and more. It may be excessive, but I still enjoyed it very much.
I also love the family themes that run throughout the story. Ellie has recently returned home to help her sister with the family bookstore. They have a great relationship, but Ellie must readjust to being back in the small town she grew up in. It is all so relatable and adds depth to the characters that no other situation could have done so effectively.
The mystery has many red herrings and twists that kept me stumped most of the time. I figured out who did it before the reveal, but I wasn't sure why. I thought all the twists and red herrings did an excellent job of keeping the puzzle pieces juggled around and the suspense high.
Characters:
Ellie Christie is the younger of the two Christie sisters. She has returned home to help with the family bookstore, where she lives with the family cat, Agatha Christie.
Meg Christie is the older of the two sisters. She's a single mom with a teenage daughter and has always lived in Last Word. She ran the bookstore with her parents until they decided to leave for an extended period, giving her and her sister ownership of the store.
Rosie Christie is Meg's daughter and is an unusually delightful teen. She loves to bake and brings different logical influences to the sisters detecting hobby.
Gram is the sister's grandmother and is often found Marpling. What is Marpling? It's sitting in the corner knitting while also collecting all the gossip to help solve the case – just like Agatha Christie's beloved sleuth Ms. Marple
Narration & Pacing:
The story is told through Ellie Christie using first-person narration. Since she's at a personal crossroads, she makes a very intriguing narrator. I enjoyed her voice and seeing the story through her eyes.
The pace should be quick due to the narration style and short chapters, but it is more of a medium pace. I believe this is due to the many details in each chapter. I loved all the details, but perhaps that was part of the problem. I wanted to catch and ponder each and every one.

Setting:
The setting is focused on the Book Chalet, which is in Last Word, Colorado. I love all the bookish details in the setting, and I found it very cool!
Read if you like:
• Agatha Christie
• Cozies set in bookish settings
• Family themes

Thank you to the publisher of DEAD AND GONDOLA by Ann Clare for giving me a chance to review this mystery fiction novel.

This is a new to me novel by a new to me author..

The Christie sisters work at a library and a mysterious stranger who visits the library ends up dead during a snowstorm.

The sisters set out to solve the mystery and find the killer before the killer strikes again. I loved the characters and the cat's name Agatha.

If I could live anywhere I’d be in a little mountain town in Colorado. I miss seasons, snow, my tree friends! When @RandomHouse reached out and offered me an early digital ARC of Dead And Gondola by Ann Claire I was thrilled and said yes while doing the bookish happy dance.
Dead And Gondola is the first in a new cosy mystery series, Christie Bookshop. In a small snowy hamlet in Last Word Colorado, the Christie family has run the Book Chalet for five generations. After traveling Meg has returned home to help her sister run the bookstore, along with resident shop-cat Agatha. There’s a cast of quirky characters, an unexpected visitor, a break in, a murder, and a disappearance. So many suspects, so many secrets! If everyone is hiding something what is a clue and what is a distraction?
This was my first cosy mystery and I couldn’t have loved it more! The location was central, a character in its own right. I was so immersed, invested, and wished I could visit this little mountain town, ride the gondola, spend the day in the bookstore, and chat with the locals at Lifties!
I recommend Dead in Gondola by Ann Claire for lovers of cosy mysteries, books set in mountain towns, and Agatha Christie style who-done-it’s. This is a perfect winter seasonal read to gift yourself, or your favorite book lover.

I love a book about books and here we have a cozy mystery set in the mountains of Colorado. Ellie Christie runs a bookstore with her sister in a quaint ski village accessible by a gondola. An unidentified man is found dead after visiting their shop and Ellie tries to solve the case with her cat, Agatha. This book is cute and I enjoyed the story but it was long for a cozy mystery and thought it was rather unoriginal. Many of the details were familiar to me from other cozies I’ve read. .

Slip into your fuzziest slippers, fix a cup of cocoa, and grab a warm blanket to curl up and read Dead and Gondola by Ann Claire, the coziest of cozy mysteries.

Meg and Ellie Christie, proprietors of the Book Chalet, and the bookshop cat, Agatha, are no relations of the famed author, but are huge fans of mysteries as well as the cat's namesake. When a stranger visits the bookshop, and then is murdered, the Christie sisters cannot resist a little investigating of their own.

For fans of the cozy genre, bookshop mysteries, and Agatha Christie, this book is a fun adventure. The Christie sisters are likeable, and Ms. Claire introduces the reader to a small town with plenty of interesting characters, all of whom are likely to reappear in future editions of this cute series. I especially enjoyed the discussion and trivia about Agatha Christie and her books, including the romances written under a pen name.

Thank you to Netgalley and Random House Publishing-Ballantine (Bantam) for the digital ARC of Dead and Gondola. The opinions in this review are my own.

A fun book to read.
If you loved the Agatha Christie books you more than likely enjoy this story which has big possibilities of becoming the first one of a series. The sister Ellie and Meg co-owners of the Book Chalet bookstore are keeping in mind their famous name share author, how she would have cleared the mystery.
Plenty of quirky characters and lots of red herrings. Suspicion all around. You do have some clues at the end that something is not completely right, and Ellie does manage to bring it to a conclusion by introducing a séance and listening to the vocal reaction of each person involved. If you’re up for some light reading, I can highly recommend this book.

This is a brand new series and I really enjoyed this first book and am looking forward to more in the series. Ellie and her sister Meg run their family's bookshop. When a man is found dead in the small town, the sisters must try and figure out what is going on! I loved the town and the characters! The descriptions make you feel like you are right there with the characters. I received an advanced readers copy and all opinions are my own.

This was a fun book to read. I liked the play on the Christie name & how the sisters are being amateur detectives. I also want to visit the Book Chalet. Highly recommend reading this book, especially if you're a fan of Agatha Christie.

Thanks to the publisher & NetGalley for advanced copy in exchange for my honest review

I didn’t enjoy this book. The premise sounded wonderful and it had certain elements that should have contributed to a lovely, cozy read (a bookstore on a snowy mountain, sisters who have a cat named after Agatha Christie, a small-town cast of characters) but it was lacking something for me. I think there wasn’t enough depth of feeling or relationship. I didn’t get the warm fuzzies between Meg and El or really anyone else’s deeper emotions or motivations. It was all more surface level. The plot wasn’t quite interesting enough to make up for the lack of character depth.

I won’t be sharing this review outside of NetGalley because I choose to only share 4 and 5 star review ARCs. Thank you for the opportunity to read this book.

If you’ve ever felt that you could solve murders based solely on the fact you’ve read, a lot, about solving murders - this one’s for you.

The Christie sisters - No, sadly not that Christie family, though they’ve tried to find a link for years - find themselves right smack dab in the middle of a murder mystery when a visitor to their remote mountain bookshop is found dead on the ski gondola in town, with some of their friends as prime suspects.

Usually, with these sorts of books, I spend most of my reading time trying to guess the killer before the reveal. This time though the residents were such interesting people - and kept me so distracted - I almost forgot they were all possible suspects and that there was a murder to solve!
Good thing I’m not an actual investigator, right?

Despite my distractions, I have to say this was a good mystery and I’d welcome another visit to Last Word.

Thanks to netgalley and Random House - Ballantine for the arc!

In the Fall I need the perfect transitional book that steps me down from my spooky horror reads and into my Hallmark Christmas escapades. Dead and Gondola was just what I was looking for! Cozy bookish murder mystery, check. Ode to Agatha Christie, check. Snowdrifts and lots of book talk, check. Oh, and an indy bookshop cat named Agatha C. (for cat) Christie with a social media presence absolutely seals the deal! The Christie sisters channel their inner Miss Marples and solve their small ski town crime spree with the help of their bookshop bookclub members. I am definitely looking forward to more of their adventures in installments to come. If I had any criticism it would be that I want to know more about the sisters, what makes them tick, and their family bookstore history. Hopefully we get more extensive character development as the series progresses.

Thank you #NetGalley and @RandomHouse Ballantine for the opportunity to read and review this ARC.

A quirky, but rather drawn-out mystery. The setting is a bookstore in Colorado and the story is narrated in the first person by Ellie Christie who has just returned home to help run the bookstore when a murder occurs. The story has many characters and takes a long time to unfold and come to a conclusion. Several references are made to Agatha Christie mysteries. Unfortunately, though a nice read and an unusual setting, there was nothing compelling that made me want to keep reading and I found this book to be a chore to get through. Thank you NetGalley for allowing me to read and review an advance copy of this book.

A bookish girl with a surname of Christie and a cozy shop high in the Rockies. A snow storm should have her cuddling in front of a fire with the shop cat, Agatha, cocoa, and the latest best-seller. -But when the stranger interrupting book club ends up dead, Ellie has to team up with sister Meg, Gram, and niece Rosie to find out both who's responsible for the murder, the following break-in, and the disappearance of their dedicated employee. This is a frigid frolic through tourist trap of a town look for clues. Agatha Christie fans will love the references subtle and otherwise to the beloved author and her many classic who-dun-its.

Thanks to NetGalley and Bantam for making an advance copy of this book available for an honest review.

What a great start to a new series. This is a wonderful cozy mystery that was a joy to read. I loved the setting, the characters and the plot. It had just the right amount of twists and turns to keep you turning the pages I look forward to reading more books in this series.
I received a complimentary copy from Random House Publishing Group via NetGalley and was not required to write a review. All opinions expressed are my own.

Dead and Gondola by Ann Claire a quirky new cozy mystery. The story is told in the first person with Ellie Christie as the narrator. The author gives picturesque descriptions of the town, bookshop, and characters. I did not feel that there always needed to be such wordy descriptions utilizing multiple adjectives. I wish I could visit Book Chalet, the Christie’s bookshop that was a former ski chalet. It has a rabbit warren of shelves filled with books (every booklover’s dream). We meet a number of characters in the beginning as the Mountains of Mystery group meets in the reading lounge. It is difficult to keep them all straight (even after reading and rereading the chapter). I felt bad for Ms. Ridge when Morgan Marin sashayed in and took control of the group. There are references to Agatha Christie and her books scattered throughout the story. I love the gondola line that runs from Last Word to the base of the mountain. The whodunit was a letdown for me. The mystery can be solved quite early in the book. There are several suspects along with misdirection. There are plenty of clues to aid readers in solving the crime. The reveal reminded me of Murder, She Wrote with a touch of Scooby Doo. I liked that all the details of the mystery were wrapped up at the end. There is a secondary mystery involving Ms. Ridge. She disappears during the Mountains of Mystery meeting. Ms. Ridge fails to return to work, and she is not at home. It is easy to guess what made Ms. Ridge do a runner. There is humor scattered throughout the book. Gram particularly provides lighthearted moments. There is also the pretentious Agatha C., a long-haired Siamese who is the queen of the Book Chalet. Let us not forget Calamity Janet, a pony with attitude. Dead and Gondola failed to capture and hold my attention. The story was a little humdrum at times, and I thought it was too long. There were also repetitive details. Those who are fans of Agatha Christie will enjoy this cozy mystery. Dead and Gondola takes us to chilly Colorado where there is a mysterious man, a pretentious pony, a silly séance, an absent assistant, curious club members, gratis gondola rides, and a Ouija board omen.

!st in a new mystery series, two sisters run the family bookstore and must solve a murder with the help of their cat and what they have learned by reading Agatha Christie