Fantastic author! Great pacing and great development for the characters. I was heavily invested in the plot and descriptive settings.

A mix of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Murder She Wrote? Say less, these are two of my favorite things. I had so much fun reading this cozy mystery in a small town where the alarmingly high body count doesn't seem to register for most people... until our librarian/amateur detective loses somebody close to her, which makes the strangeness a little harder to ignore.

The humor and mystery were a great combo, and I'll gladly read more of Sherry's adventures.

I received a free copy of this book thanks to NetGalley and Berkley Publishing Group; all opinions expressed are exclusively my own.

This book was an absolute delight! I don't know if there are a lot of Hercule Poirot/Buffy the Vampire Slayer fans out there, but I am one and this book feels written directly for me. For those who are unfamiliar, The Village Library Demon-Hunting Society starts out as a classic cozy murder mystery tale with these strange... glitches. As the story progresses, the supernatural element comes out, and the characters are embroiled in a battle against something very old and VERY powerful. To be honest, in some ways the story most parallels that of Coraline, so if you had Miss Marple in Buffy the Vampire Slayer's world following the plot of Coraline, you'd have something very like this book, and that is high praise indeed.

For sensitive readers, there are depictions of off-page death, death of loved ones, body horror, loss of bodily autonomy, and violence.

I absolutely adore Sherry. This is who I thought I'd be as a librarian. She describes others in terms of her favorite book characters, she plants fairy gardens, and her books help her solve crimes. The call-backs to various stories and characters - and name-dropping authors - are delightful.

"She wondered whether Peter ever thought of her as a storybook animal. If he did, she would probably be a fat old badger in a bonnet."

And Sherry's musings often just make me, a fellow librarian, giggle. "She'd tried many methods over the years to treat her occasional insomnia, but she'd yet to find one as reliably efficacious as Tolstoy."

I'd describe this as a cozy mystery - it feels much like my favorite Atherton series, the Aunt Dimity stories. And it definitely feels like Christie's adventures! I mean, except for the demon thing. 😉

"I wanted a librarian. I had to look a long time to find you. A librarian who knows about the stories."

At any rate, I loved it! And, you know, there's always someone who enjoys the stories, no matter how they're retold!

A delightfully cozy novel for library lovers and mystery fans alike. The smalltown murder-solving Librarian is a hoot of a lady, one I'd like to sit down and have tea with to discuss the latest news on the most recent crime. Written with humorous wit, this author is one I am likely to revisit again and again when in need of a light and fluffy mystery and lots of smiles while reading.

[received an arc from netgalley and berkley publishing group, thank you!]

this book had some nice ideas, but the execution was middling, in my opinion. i think it struggles to balance the 'cozy' with the 'mystery'--it's hard to have stakes in a story that is deliberately trying to shock you out of the boundaries of its own genre [that being a genre in which stakes are extremely low]. i do admire this book's desire to have well-rounded characters, but its methods of doing so were to jumble together a series of random traits into one long, rpg-style character paragraph upon introduction and then disregard those traits almost entirely later on in the story. still, i liked sherry as a main character, and i would've preferred her in a book that took itself in one of two directions of 'cozy mystery/thriller', as opposed to trying to balance between the two.

thanks to NetGalley for the eARC

⭐️=4 | 😘=2.5 | 🤬=3 | ⚔️=2 | 15+

summary: a woman has been solving murders in her small town—but wait! why are there so many murders in a tiny town? is her cat possessed?? what supernatural wonders are afoot??????

thoughts: this is a bizarre, cozy, spooky, silly, clever sort of book. pacing was occasionally off, but the mystery was genuinely great, and the concept itself is so strange that I couldn’t not be intrigued. the first chapter feels really weird, but by the time you get to the end of the book everything makes sense and it’s actually really smart. yay!

This book started out SO strong but got a little lost in the middle and only meandered from there. I was so enamoured of the “small town Gilmore girls solves a murder” setting of winesap within the first 50 pages or so. Then the cat started to talk. By the time i reached the middle i think the author had really lost the plot: there was actually a motive for every murder? But also there was a demon causing the murder? But also the protagonist did a Hercule poirot style takedown of the real life reasons for the murder that didn’t actually involve the demon? This book would have been better served just sticking to the real world, sadly! What could have been an excellent fantasy was ruined by trying to do too much.

Sherry Pinkwhistle is the local librarian and is concerned abut the number of dead bodies that are piling up in her small village. When a friend dies and her cat convinces her that he is the spirit of Lord Cromwell she becomes certain her village has been taken over by demons. With the help of her friends and co-workers from the library they investigate and save the village. Cute story of the absurd.

Great unique twist on the paranormal mystery scene. Fun start to what I hope becomes a long running series.

This is a terrific and fun, easy to read mystery that’s very clever. It warps form a few times which may be a bit tough for some but worked for me. The characters are almost all cliches of different types of people - but given the genre - that’s part of the fun. I read this quickly because I enjoyed the experience. It’s not a challenging book; it’s a bit messy; but ultimately a pleasure.
As a librarian, I tend to avoid books with librarians as main characters because they are often cringy - Sherry Pinkwhistle embraces all the stereotypes but manages to be a fully formed character who I can see following to future adventures.

_The Village Library Demon-Hunting Society_ by C.M. Waggoner is an easy and cozy murder mystery with paranormal aspects and likeable quirky characters. Small-town librarian Sherry Pinkwhistle is the resident amateur murder investigator who becomes directly invested in solving the deaths of the village when a loved one is targeted. It seems there is a demon possessing the town, and Sherry and her friends, accompanied by Sherry’s possessed cat, must solve the murders and save their village from the supernatural. This was an enjoyable and quick read.

2.5/5 stars rounded to three. This book was sort of a slog for me. I came for a cozy mystery with supernatural twist, which is what I got, but something I can’t quite put my finger on kept me from eating it up. The main character, an elderly librarian named Sherry Pinkwhistle, has already been solving murder mysteries in Winesap, New York, for quite a while, and is known by the community for her exceptional deductive power. The twist involves demonic possession. I should have been all over this, but sadly, I found the storytelling bland and the characters pretty flat.

Thank you to Netgalley and Ace Publishing for an ARC copy in exchange for my honest review.

This book was confusing - confusing because it read like a sequel but wasn't, confusing because the time period wasn't specified but couldn't be modern-day, confusing because what do demons have to do with anything anyway, but then, all (mostly) was revealed (I'm still a bit unclear on the whole demons thing).

Sherry is a older woman working as a librarian in a small town in New York. It starts to occur to her that there are an inordinate number of murders for such a small town and how odd it is that she manages to solve them each time. As she starts to become aware that there is something not quite right about the town and the way the people, including the sheriff, just accept the high number of murders and her involvement in solving them the murders strike close to home and then things get even stranger. As she declines to investigate the murder of her boyfriend it becomes very obvious that something is seriously wrong in Winesap as the sheriff first demands her help and then arrests her. Oh, and her cat starts talking to her
This was an interesting read though a bit slow and hard to get into in the beginning. Winesap is a present day town that inexplicably seems to the stuck in the 1980s. In the beginning I wasn’t sure I liked Sherry very much but she is definitely the type of person one wants on one’s side if there are problems, real world or supernatural. The cat, while offering a couple of useful insights to help Sherry realize what is going on, really played a small part in the story. While I can understand the demon being able to control the town and its people I am still not clear why Sherry did not realize that incongruity of a town living like it was still the 1980s - townspeople seemingly ignorant of the existence of cell phones or the Internet - when she apparently went to New York City for plays and dinners with her boyfriend. The conclusion was satisfying and overall this was an enjoyable read. Recommended

Well, that was extra weird, and I liked it. I had no notion going into it what it was about, though you’d think the title would’ve given me a clue. The main character was perfectly imperfect, and I loved the old school detective novel/TV series format, with the strange demon-y twist. I didn’t know whodunnit until the big Poirot-esque reveal, and it really was clever. This book feels like part of a series, which seemed intentional- I really hope it becomes one, I can’t wait to read more by this author!

Thanks to NetGalley and Ace for the ARC!

This was cuuuuute!!

I love the idea of murder mystery meets demon hunting and I thought Sherry Pinkwhistle was the perfect protagonist for it. I mean, come on. She's a librarian named Sherry Pinkwhistle with a dark, mysterious past that is constantly alluded to... Of course, I was sat.

And obviously Miss Pinkwhistle has a ragtag group of besties helping her throughout all of this - a priest, a widow, a psychiatrist, and a cat possessed by the ghost of Lord Thomas Cromwell.

Truly what more could a girl ask for?

This would be such a good autumnal/Halloween-time read and I WILL be recommending it to everyone upon release.

I tried starting this a couple of times and couldn't get into the writing. I forced myself through and it was ok but around the halfway point it went off the rails too much and I threw in the towel.

urban-fantasy, cozy-mystery, contemporary, supernatural, suspense, suspicion, Upstate New York, librarian, library, cat-familiar, amateur-sleuth, small-town, friction, friends, demon, demon-hunter, verbal-humor, situational-humor, local-law-enforcement, murder-investigation, murder****

This lighthearted cozy mystery complete with a librarian, demons, quirky characters, and fun references to classic sleuths is perfect for the beach or to destress after a real day at work. Great fun!
I requested and received a free temporary EARC from Berkley Publishing Group | Ace via NetGalley. Thank you!
Available Sep 24 2024

The Village Library Demon-Hunting Society may appear to be a straightforward murder mystery book at first; however appearances can be deceiving and sometimes the truth is stranger than fiction - especially if supernatural forces are at play. After a shocking number of seemingly unrelated successive murders take place in an otherwise serene small village, our tenacious librarian Sherry Pinkwhistle feels like something is just not right. Secrets are revealed as Sherry investigates murders and makes a few friends - and enemies - along the way.
This was a fun and fascinating murder mystery. I really enjoyed Sherry and the supporting cast of characters. I would have enjoyed a little more closure on a few items but definitely acknowledge that is just personal preference that I want to know all the things. The supernatural elements were an intriguing element that definitely kept me guessing!

Thank you to NetGalley and Berkley Publishing Group for this ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.