Murders at the Montgomery Hall Hotel by Gina Kirkham - Book Review

Murders at the Montgomery Hall Hotel by Gina Kirkham

Publication Date: 14th Nov 2022

Genre: Contemporary Humorous Cozy Mystery (cum Romance)

3.5 Stars 

One Liner: Interesting premise but got a few misses 

*****

Librarian Prunella Pearce and her bestie Bree are all set to start a detective agency after their success in the previous case (book one). The duo and other ladies of the Winterbottom Women’s Institute go to Montgomery Hall Hotel for Halloween to enjoy a murder mystery weekend away from the village. 

The hotel’s current owner Tarragon Montgomery is stuck between matriarch Cecily (who doesn’t want to make changes to the place) and his money-loving wife, Stephanie. As if things aren’t bad enough, there seems to be a thief at their barely surviving hotel. 

Psychic Selma, who was to be a part of the murder mystery weekend, has been replaced by an impostor with an ulterior motive. With a raging storm outside and the Winterbottom women going wild (thanks to free-flowing booze), it’s up to Pru and Bree to solve the cases and determine if there’s a connection between the mysteries. 

Can the duo repeat their success? 

The story comes from multiple POVs. 

What I Like: 

The book works great as a standalone despite being the second in the series. The characters can be a bit confusing (continued in the next section), but the plot is independent. 

The pacing is steady and consistent even when nothing seems to be happening. That’s hard to achieve in a book with 350+ pages, but here it keeps going without slowing down. 

The mystery, as such, isn’t much. We can figure it out in the first quarter of the book. It’s more of ‘how will all these threads come together, and will the criminal be nabbed’ that keeps the reader moving. 

The book is more of a chick-lit and family drama with murders thrown into the mix. Though that wasn’t what I expected, I readjusted my expectations and could enjoy the book (to an extent). 

The scenes with the killer are decent and well done. They don’t delve into the darker side but show enough glimpses to create an impact. 

What Didn’t Work for Me: 

There are three ladies whose names start with C. Two of them stick together and are kinda bosom buddies (in many ways). This doesn’t help in remembering who is who, especially when all of them are loud. 

I have no issues with old ladies lacking a filter or making sexual innuendo jokes. But there’s only so much I can read without rolling my eyes at the constant sex jokes (it doesn’t help that some of those went over my head). There’s a difference between older ladies speaking their minds and blabbering. I like the former kind, while the book has the latter. Also, I don’t particularly like the ladies being used as comic relief. 

Humorous cozies are fun (I recently enjoyed a goofy book). However, here the slapstick comedy and the murders don’t gel completely in this book. The author can write (the book is very visual). It just wasn’t that good for me. I also see how this will make a great script for the screen (after editing). The comedy I found too much in the book can be appealing when enacted by people. 

To summarize, Murders at the Montgomery Hall Hotel is the book for you if you like mindless comedy and jokes with a bunch of murders thrown into the mix. The cover is super cool, though. 

Thank you, Bloodhound Books, for the eARC.