I loved the idea of this book from the moment I read the blurb, it just sounded like it was going to be a fun read I could get lost in. I wasn't wrong its a very fun read that I've spent the majority of today reading, so much so that I lost track of time and almost forgot that I needed to write this review! It's a brilliantly written book and I loved that we had alternating chapters from a variety of characters, it was really good to get the different points of view.
I hated Gary from the first moment he stepped onto the page, I really think he got what he deserved, it couldn't have happened to a worse guy. And with each of his chapters I read the more I wish he'd had a more horrible ending, I know that sounds bad but he really was a toad of a man.
I adored the friendship of Clio, Amber and Jeanie they are exactly the kind of friends we all want to have, the kind that will help you get rid of a body if you need them too! The fact that they instantly don't question that Clio couldn't have done it and they need to find the real murderer is just brilliant, I loved them for it.
This review might just end up with a list of what I loved about this book if I'm not careful so let's just sum it up as this is a fantastic book, I'm so bloody glad it's part of a series and I can't wait for book two next year. Also, the cover is just so fun and bold, i love the block colour approach to book covers and I'm glad book two has a similar cover because they will look stunning on my bookcase.

Fast paced witty whodunnit book! This is the perfect book to keep you entertained whilst sat by the fire this winter!

First in series ... and I so want to read the next ones!

Clio, Amber and Jeanie are close friends. On Clio's forty-fifth birthday they get together to sing, dance and get drunk - as tight friend do. Only Clio got so drunk that she can't remember what happened when she went out for air .. then she came back to find her almost ex-husband dead on the doorstep. Did she do it? She doesn't know - and she's threatened it often enough . . .

You would think this would be straightforward enough - hah, anything but! I loved the relationship between these three women. They would do anything for each other .. until it comes to the crunch, then what happens? Full of angst, options and so much fun this is a mystery which I couldn't put down! Some very smart writing had me glued to the very end. Delicious and, best of all, first in a brand new series! Five glowing stars from me.

My thanks to the publisher for my copy via NetGalley; this is - as always - my honest, original and unbiased review.

This was a very campy murder mystery. Heavy on the British (which obviously makes sense but can take you out of it when you don’t know what they’re talking about so often). The murder victim is comically unlikable. Can’t say I predicted the ending too early.

When Clio threatened her ex-husband Gary Goode the previous day, she didn’t really mean that she would kill him, although he had sunk to new depths this time raiding her daughter’s university fund. However, when she wakes the following morning on her 45th birthday where she is celebrating with her two oldest friends Amber (disgraced sacked police detective) and Jeanie (mother of young twins), she finds someone else has conveniently done the job for her and left him on the doorstep of her grotty static caravan at Sunshine Sands. Amber thwarts Jeanie and Clio’s attempt to hide his body and calls the police but is then dismayed to find her old boss DCI Marco Santini (no love lost there) in charge of the case. Clio is obviously the prime suspect, not helped by the fact that the copious amounts of alcohol they imbibed the night before means she has little memory of her actions, so there’s nothing for it but for the three mature friends to solve this crime themselves.
These ladies are absolute stars and I often found myself identifying with them at different points and their sometimes eccentric behaviour. The story swaps between the present and the previous day, and covers all their lives, including cash-strapped Gary’s dubious deeds in the run up to his death. Gary is truly despicable, cheating on his new girlfriend with the wife of one of his wealthy clients and the plans he has for some of the houses he wants to work on are awful. Fast paced and extremely funny, you’d almost want to murder Gary yourself at times. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and I’m eager to see what these three friends get up to in book two.

This feel good murder mystery is mainly about friendship. With a seaside setting, the plot is fast paced and the dialogue can be hilarious. I particularly enjoyed the descriptions of Gary being such an obnoxious man! I’m looking forward to the next adventures of this detecting trio.

This one took me a while to get into. 3.5 Stars. The beginning felt slow, I did not like Clio, I just want it to shake her! (LOL) Amber, she was one minded and ready for anything. In the other side Amber was a new mom of twins who even though she was at her wits end, she was the for her friends and I loved that.

The plot of the story was interesting but it felt like the mystery was a bit bland.

I will be reading the next one because there was a good base for a cozy, laugh at loud mystery. We'll see...

Clio wakes up the morning after her birthday celebrations with not just a hangover but a dead ex on her doorstep .
Gary Clio’s ex was a despicable man and doesn’t mind who he cheats and robs in order to stay on top of his game . So he’s certainly not short of enemies .
Clio and her friends Amber and Jeanie have hit the cocktails hard to celebrate Clio’s birthday but on finding Gary’s body they take it in to their own hands to try and track down the killer in their own unconventional way.
The writing is excellent and the story moves on at a fair pace having a nice mix of humour and characters you can relate to although they are a bit scatter brained at times .
An enjoyable cosy mystery read that kept me guessing to the identity of the killer .
Hoping to read more escapades from the bad girls detective agency soon.
Thanks to NetGalley and Boldwood Books.

This is a fabulous high camp, hi drama, messy English cosy mystery. It’s third person with multiple POVs between our three besties Clio, Amber and Jeanie, and Gary (Clio's newly dead ex). It’s very slapstick-y funny and shambolic in a Bridget Jones chaotic way.

As light as a feather, this is a weekend read with fun characters we can empathise with. There's some pathos too - Clio's over-parenting of Nina, Jeanie's low self esteem, Amber's doggedness all get them into trouble. Basically they all need a hug. It's a cosy mystery so they find the villain but so much goes on to get them there, too many things to mention and potential spoilers, but basically if you like light and funny and chaos and likeable characters muddling through, this is a great read!

Three and a half stars. Thank you NetGalley and Boldwood Books for the ARC.

While cozy books are not my usual genre, this was a fun read with some quirky characters and some great twists. It was nice to see the variety of women/social statuses/ages represented.

Thanks to NetGalley and Boldwood Books for an advance reader's copy.

After a drunken night with her friends, Clio finds her ex-husband dead on her doorstep. She doesn’t know how he got there or who killed him. Gary her ex is odious and stole all of Clio’s money as well as clearing out her daughter’s bank account, taking the savings she had planned to help fund her place at university.
Clio becomes the main suspect in the murder enquiry, but can’t remember enough to clear her name. As she learns more, Clio confesses to Gary’s murder to cover for someone close whom she believes to be guilty. Meanwhile, Clio’s best friends decide to investigate the murder and vow to clear her name, and soon learn there to be a list of people who wanted Gary dead.
The book takes the reader on a journey, jumping between before and after the murder and we learn just what a horrible man Clio’s ex was. It’s peppered with social media posts which add a further level of insight into the plot.
This is Katie Marsh’s first outing into cosy murder mysteries, and the start of a series. I have read and thoroughly enjoyed all of her previous books, but this one just didn’t do it for me. An ok read but I found it very difficult to get into and neither the plot nor characters grew on me with time. I just didn’t find it to be the same compulsive read I have experienced with Katie’s other books.

5 stars~

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me an ARC in exchange for an honest review!

Honestly I loved this cozy mystery. It was so easy to read and I flew through it. I felt like I couldn’t put it down until I finished it. I loved the characters, and I love the friendship of the main 3 characters. What really sold me on this book were the multiple POVs, and especially how they included the POV of the victim leading up to their death. It was such an interesting POV and I loved how it added even more to the story! I do think the ending felt a bit drawn out, but I can overlook that for all the other positives!

I loved this book. It was a great mystery with lots of laughs. I also loved the fact the characters were older. A bonus point from me! I loved the characters and following the clues.

Thank you for the opportunity to read this arc!

How Not to Murder Your Ex is an entertaining, fun read with some great characters and a great storyline. The strength of the women’s relationship was wonderful- Clio, Amber and Jeanie would walk through fire for eachother, and their support and belief in one another was a real high point of the story for me.
I really enjoyed the different points of view throughout - showing the different personalities, it enabled us as the reader to get a different perspective on the timing of events.

Booktour with Rachel’s random resources

I love a good mystery with relatable characters and a big splash of humor. This hit the mark on all counts. I absolutely loved every single character, the mystery was fantastic and I was laughing throughout the book.

Clio is trying to make ends meet after her soon-to-be ex-husband, Gary, took her business and home, and she has every reason to want him gone. Or so she thought until the moment she found his body on her front steps, and she becomes the prime suspect. Now she and her two best friends are on a quest to solve his murder and clear Clio’s name. It turns out there are plenty of people who wanted Gary dead.

I am ecstatic that this book is becoming a series because I just need more. It was entertaining from the very first page and I finished it in under a day because I simply could not put it down.

This review is based on an uncorrected e-galley of this novel

After celebrating her 45th birthday with her two best friends Amber and Jeanie, Clio is dismayed to discover the body of her unpleasant ex Gary on the doorstep of her caravan in the early hours of the following morning. She is even more dismayed when she recalls that the three friends had spent some time the previous night discussing how much they all hated him! Mind you, after Gary stole all of Clio's money - forcing her to move into the caravan while managing her responsibilities as a single parent to her teenage daughter Nina - it could hardly be considered unreasonable of Clio to hate him. Not enough to kill him, obviously. But will the police believe that?

Amber and Jeanie have their own issues to contend with - the former having been ejected from the police force, and the latter being a new mother to twin babies. Still, it's up to the trio to find a way of clearing Clio. Dealing with Gary when he was alive was bad enough, but being blamed for his death is definitely a bridge too far!

The story is told from the perspective of the three women - and also, interestingly, from Gary's perspective in the period just before his death. This works reasonably well, but the mixed media approach that many thrillers have been using to good effect recently seems less well-suited to a cozy mystery. An story with an entertaining premise, a gentle humor permeates the story, adding to its appeal. However, I didn't really start to connect with the characters until the very end of the novel, making it drag on in parts.

Thanks to NetGalley, the publisher, and the author for an advanced copy of this novel.

I devoured this book in one sitting. It's a fun read with older characters for a change, with lots of red herrings and characters that are totally believable and a story that could happen to anyone, with exes you hate! Told from the perspective of the three women friends, it gives you a good look at all three characters and what they will do for each other and their backgrounds. it's a fun tale that will leave you laughing out loud and eagerly awaiting the next book in the series, Murder on the Dance Floor, which comes out next month.

Gary Good is a man with an over inflated opinion of himself and the soon to be ex-husband of Cleo who’s birthday it happens to be. Since he took everything from her including her half of the business and it’s monetary value she has been living in her first husband and father of her daughter Nina‘s mobile home park. For her birthday like every year her best friend Amber and Jeannie come over for a slumber party karaoke and some mixed drinks… Way too many mixed drinks because Clea doesn’t remember most of the night genie passes out and Amber locked her self in Clyas itty-bitty bathroom. When Clea returns back from her walk on the beach she finds her ex husband Gary dead at the bottom of her steps this is when she starts to panic. She wants to hide his body so she can figure out who really killed him because she knows she will be the main suspect but little does the birthday girl know Gary had a lot of enemies. Thankfully her best friend Amber gets her self out of the bathroom and takes control of the situation before Genie and Claire can move Gary’s body she is an ex detective and for reasons she is not telling anyone she was recently fired but calls the police anyway and then tells her best friends to tell the truth. There’s so much happening in this book and it is all fun and I often say I thoroughly enjoyed the book but I wish there was a more impressive statement I could write in my review to explain just how much enjoyment this book brought me. It seems everyone in Clea‘s circle of friends are so lovable including Nina and Clya’s ex and Nina’s dad Das this is definitely a hood on it and before you’re halfway through you think you know but trust me when I say you know nothing! That was blackmail treachery cheating duplicitous friends horrible fathers crappy detectives and oh yes let me just said Amber is going to use this opportunity to prove she is much smarter than Marco the man who fired her and her coworker for 20 years and that just adds to the lol moments love and birth so much that was such a great book and one I definitely recommend it was so much fun! I want to thank both good books and NetGalley for my free arc copy please forgive any mistakes as I am blind and dictate my review.

Mixed group of characters and multiple pov’s made for an interesting read. The mystery of who did the deed was alright but I did like the trio trying to solve it. 3 stars.

Took a bit to get into and some 0f the characters were not particularly likable relatable but whoddunit kept me reading until the end. 2.5 stars⭐️