Maggie Dove kept me guessing until the end! A great small town mystery that you can’t put down. Susan Breen did a wonderful job describing the town and made you just feel like you were part of it.

Maggie Dove is a retired Mystery Author and Sunday School Teacher so when a real life mystery lands right in her yard of course she has to investigate! The book was an enjoyable and quick read with a fun cast of characters – although I did find parts of it to get a little too Preachy. If you can get past those spots it’s an enjoyable read!
I received an ARC of this book from the publisher, via Netgalley and Chatterbox, in exchange for an honest review.

This looked like a great book, but unfortunately it was archived before I could read it. I will pay more attention to that before requesting. Thank you.

Very cute and cozy read! This is the first in a new series, and I am very much looking forward to the next installment!

This was a nice read. Maggie Dove is a widow and Sunday School teacher that stumbles on a mystery when her neighbor is killed. I liked the author's writing style. The mystery was a little predictable but interesting enough to keep me turning the pages. I liked the different characters and their roles in the story. I look forward to reading more from this author.

This was a great book, and I loved the story. It was an excellent cozy mystery, and I would love to read more by this author. I had actually forgotten that I had received this book from this site, which is why my review is, umm, a bit late.

A Sunday School teacher who is mourning her daughter's death years ago. A woman who is fighting with her neighbor(like everyone in suburbia.) Maggie Dove can seem judgmental and righteous, but she has her flaws. When her neighbor turns up dead, we're left wondering whodunit? Her late daughter's boyfriend, whom Maggie loves like a friend?

I enjoyed this cozy mystery, although I did guess the suspect early on and thought the characters were largely unlikable. I particularly liked the religious aspect. Maggie is not a perfect Christian which may turn off some readers, but is actually more realistic. None of us are perfect and even though Maggie has faith, she still struggles in life.

Overall, a good easy read.

While not face paced and intense, this book is a good read. The characters are fun and likeable and the mystery is good. It's a cute little cozy mystery that's enjoyble.

This was good read. Not a usual read for me, but it is a good cozy mystery book. This was a simple but easy to read.

Thanks to House Party and Chatterbox, I received an advance copy of this sweet little mystery. If you shy away from mysteries because they leave you feeling uneasy or the authors share a little too much detail, please give this book a read! Think Cabot Cove and Jessica Fletcher (Murder She Wrote)-- a mystery that uses the rules of deduction with a great main character. Even the author threw in a line of dialogue where the police chief asks Maggie if she thinks she's Jessica Fletcher. While it wasn't as intense as many thriller mysteries I read, I found the pace of the story to move along and I didn't want to put it down until I discovered "who did it!" #RHMysteryPack #Sponsored

This book would probably be alright for baby boomer aged women. I know one of my 70 something aunts would love it. She loves mysteries with talking cats. I couldn't relate to any of the characters and found myself really disliking them.

I received this book free through Random House Monthly Mystery in return for my honest review.
The mystery was intriguing with a bit of a twist at the end. I had speculations early on about who done it, but not their reasoning (which is somewhat less important to me as who done it)! I felt Maggie had a conflicting personality with struggling to be her idea of the typical Sunday School teacher but still living in the community she does. Her going back and forth between wanting to throw rocks and her neighbor and feeling sorry for him. Overall it was a good read. I was kept entertained and was curious to know what happened.

This book was ok. I didn’t like the main character and just didn’t enjoy the subliminal understatements. I might try more from this author in the future. It wasn’t horrible, it just wasn’t for me.

I am sorry that I never received this book and was not able to review it. My email was a tshanahan@85 kindle address but in 32 kindles in my name, none of them had that address. I don't know how I ever gave you that address. It was a ridiculous mistake.

I looked forward to reading this book and am sorry I missed it.

I received this download free from NetGalley but my review is completely my own.

This book was not my cup of tea. The main character is a little old for my taste and a little too goody-two-shoes. The writing style was not bad and I'm sure those who can connect more with the main character would like this novel.

Yuck. Sorry but as soon as the religious remarks and undertones come into play, I'm out. The main character was preachy and judgemental. Couldn't finish it.

I liked Susan Breen's writing style. Her characters, though, were lacking for me. I didn't find a single one very likeable. Breen was so focused on making them realistically flawed, she missed out on making them lovable. Maggie Dove, the lead, is a 60-something-year-old widow who teaches Sunday School. Dove has been through some loss, and this (at least) really resonated with me. Having lost someone young to a tragic accident 8 years ago, I felt Breen really nailed the emotional journey of that. I believe Dove was supposed to come off as an every-day hero, someone who would get down to business and sleuth out the answers, even when the police failed. But Dove appeared sort of hysterical to me, a busy body who "reluctantly" got involved in drama and secretly liked it. The murderer in this book (no spoilers!) was obvious from the start. There's one glaring outlier and he/she did it. Also, the mode of death (spoiler!) was Ecstasy and I could tell the author had no genuine experience with the substance. Ecstasy is a crap murder weapon - it's expensive, it creates side-effects that would be obvious before being fatal, and it expands the pupils to cartoonish proportions (which would be a dead giveaway during autopsy).

I thought it started slow and dragged a bit. But once it got going it was a great story. The end was a little to quick and forced, and I didn't relate to the Church stuff - so I could have done without it. I wish the conclusion "whodoneit" part was thought out better- it was a great concept but it all seemed forced into one page of dialogue.

Review from 2016:

I didn't enjoy this one as much as I hoped & I'm not sure why. I had trouble staying interested & didn't connect with the characters. Not sure if it was the writing style or storyline or if it was just me. I normally enjoy cozy mystery books, but I have been in a book slump lately. So, I still may try another book by this author another time or give this one a re-read.

I was given an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. Thanks to Random House & House Party/Chatterbox for this opportunity!
#RHMysteryPack #Sponsored

This is marketed as a cozy mystery, but it is about the darkest cozy I have ever read. The entire book is very brooding. I had a hard time finding any sympathy for the main character, Maggie. A devout Sunday school teacher, she is also quite judgmental and even mean at times. Yes, her general demeanor is related to the death of her daughter, but honestly after the third or fourth time that is brought up and dissected to death, I was over hearing about it. The book also has a very strong Christian theme to it and I grew tired of being preached at. The mystery itself is okay. Not fabulous, but not the worst I've read. But between the unlikable main character and the overly religious aspect, I will not pick up another book by her.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1673524823