I have read everything that Sheila Connolly has written. This book marks the debut of her Victorian Village series. It was engaging. I enjoyed learning the history around the town that was nearly bankrupt and what they were doing to try and save it. The mystery was interesting and I look forward to seeing the characters develop in future books.

I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for a honest review.

I was pretty excited to get this as I really like this author. I have to admit that I am kind of disappointed as this was just an average cozy mystery, not anything spectacular and certainly not like the author's previous books. Kate is an okay, but slightly annoying MC who has a tendency to berate herself mentally [which gets annoying] and seems to be unsure of herself, even though she has been to college and had held a very respectable job due to an unfortunate incident that happened her senior year in high school with her HS nemesis. Who, conveniently turns up dead just as Kate comes to the town of her youth to help them bail themselves out of the debt they have suddenly found themselves in [it is all kind of convoluted] because she has suddenly found herself out of a job. Confused yet? Uh-huh. Me too.
I had the murderer guessed early on - like in the chapter they are introduced. It was pretty obvious [to me] and because of that, it seemed to take forever to get to the end. Where we have some slightly forced-feeling romance and the reveal. Which was totally anticlimactic.
Just an average, meh read.

DNF at 25%

I've never read a book by Sheila Connolly but, being a big cozy mystery reader, I had seen her name around and was interested in trying her out. Unfortunately this book was not for me. I gave it a fair chance but I just wasn't enjoying it so decided to not finish it. While I was interested in the premise of the book, I found the characters grated on me, especially Kate, and the general storytelling style just didn't peak my interest.
That being said, I would try another series by this author but I won't be reading anymore in the Victorian Village series.

My rating: 3 of 5 stars, I liked it.

Book one in the series.

I love all of Sheila Connolly's books, so when I saw that she had a new series, I was excited.

She didn't let me down. I love the setting, the small town that's seen better days, and the characters, determined to save their town. The main character, Katherine, took me a bit to warm up to. At the start she was a bit snooty, feeling so superior to her old school friend. But as she began to warm up to the town, I began to warm up to her. Now I just want to see where things go and I am totally rooting for this little town!

I can't wait until book 2 comes out!

Murder at the Mansion was a satisfying start to a new cozy mystery series. I love the small town feel in these kind of cozy mysteries. Sheila Connolly is one of my go to cozy authors and this new series looks to not disappoint. I’m looking forward to reading more.

A great start to a new series. If you have enjoyed previous cozy mysteries by this author then you will not be disappointed. I really enjoyed the engaging characters. Throw in a mansion and a murder and you have the makings of fun mystery series! Lots of twists and turns will have you guessing until the very end. I am eagerly awaiting the next book in this series!

I really enjoyed this first in a new series and am looking forward to what the next book will bring.

Kate Hamilton was working for a boutique hotel in Baltimore when her high school best friend asked her to come back to her hometown of Asheboro, MD to help the town solve their finance issues. The town had bought an old mansion, was basically broke now, and Lisbeth just knew that Kate would figure out the best way to use that mansion and save the town's finances. Add to that, Kate's old high school nemesis sat on town council and had plans of her own she hoped to pitch for using the mansion. When that girl was found dead in front of the house, Kate was worried she'd be a suspect since she and Cordy hadn't gotten along in high school. Along with the murder mystery, there was a side mystery that concerned some old letters from Clara Barton to the man who had owned the house, Henry Barton. If those letters were authentic, they would possibly bring in money to help out the town.

I didn't guess the perp of the side mystery and I didn't guess the killer until the author started sprinkling clues. When the killer was taken in and Kate's museum friend was brought in to authenticate any pieces from the house, there was no doubt that Kate's plan was beginning to be doable, especially with a museum backing them. I am anxious to find out what happens next!

I really liked these characters. Kate and Lisbeth re-started their friendship without any problems. Lisbeth would be an awesome friend to have. I also was glad the detective on the case was nice and didn't assume right away that Kate or anyone else that Cordelia didn't get along with was guilty. Kate's high school boyfriend wasn't the jerk that some ex-boyfriends are, probably since they hadn't seen each other in awhile but I was glad what they mutually decided. And Josh, the history professor Kate became friends with, wasn't a typical, stuffy old professor, but someone she enjoyed talking to and maybe other possibilities are even there in future books.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an ARC of this book provided by NetGalley and the publisher.

What a nice start to a new series. Which is not surprising coming from Sheila Connolly! She is a natural storyteller. I am looking forward to seeing how the Victorian village develops.

Many thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for a copy of this book, which I voluntarily chose to review.

A very interesting twist to bring the main character back to the small town she fled, but unfortunately she finds herself embroiled in a murder investigation just as she is starting to realize that she would like to stay and help save the town. Excellent character development gives you a connection to people that you care about and like as well as want to get to know better. The character development definitely enhances the story and makes you feel more invested as you want the main character to succeed. I'm quite happy that I found this book and really hope the author turns this into a series as I would like to continue to follow the characters and their path to save the town!

This is a cozy Mystery Romance. It starts with a phone call from a friend of Kat's , Lisbeth, from the small town in Maryland where they grew up together. This has to have been written years ago, because it doesn't make sense to me that the most prominent person in town couldn't have been Googled, and find out everything you wanted to know in a hour! However, that's not what happens , a nasty , mean spirited girl Cordelia from High School is murdered in this beautiful Victorian home. Then it becomes who did it, and why? I figured it out after a conversation Kate has with the person, still, that was the best part of the book. It was incredibly boring, all of this historical research, and things Kate didn't know about the Civil War, although she grew up in Maryland? I believe that part, I meet many people who don't have a clue about much of anything important! So, no, I don't recommend, it needed more slashes from the Editor. Thank you Netgalley.
http://www. carolintallahassee.Wordpress.com

I really enjoyed this book, it is the first book in the series. Kate Hamilton loses her job in management at a hotel in Baltimore. Her friend from high school contacts her and ask if she can help with the town because it is going down hill fast. Then the girl everyone hated in high school dies. Kate wants to figure out who killed her.
I think this series will be do well. The story kept my interest the whole time.

This is the debut of author Sheila Connolly's new "Victorian Village Mystery Series." The author is a favorite of mine and I have read her entire body of work. It is always thrilling to read a new series by a beloved cozy mystery author. This is a outstanding mystery and a wonderful start to a fresh new exciting cozy series. I look forward to following this series as it progresses.
I thank the publisher and Net Galley for the ARC for review. My opinions are my own.

This debut introduces us to a setting of a lovely small town of Asheboro, MD. The town has just suffered a series of storms and setbacks with their businesses putting the towns economy in peril. On the edge of the town is a lovely Victorian that needs to be restored. The city council has already turned down offers to rebuild it.
Kate has a degree in Hospitality Management and has just been downsized. Her friend Lisbeth in town contacts her to come back and help repair the community. Kate comes up with a proposal to save the Victorian and presents it to the city council. This plan will bring the home back to its original state and save it from demolition or development which is the wish of the council. It has great historic significance and the town looks forward to putting her proposal in motion.
As her plan progresses with the town she visits the home with a business associate and finds a body of the woman who originally wanted to turn it into a B&B. Now Kate must solve the mystery, clear her own name and find the suspect before her reputation in town is ruined and her plans for saving the home fall apart.
This is a wonderful story of great depth with historic information of one of America's classic grand old homes, a small town on the brink of failure and one person determined to save the home and thus help her small town thrive. The charcters all add depth to the story and the setting is beautiful . I loved the protagonist Kate , she is savvy, smart and takes action. The sleuth was very well crafted and I was drawn into the clues and surprised at the end. Ms. Connolly has a winning series here and I look forward to the next in series. A fantastic cozy mystery ! Well done to the author.

New series by Sheila Connolly and I really liked it. I liked learning the history around the town that was nearly bankrupt and what they were doing to try and save it. The mystery is interesting and I look forward to seeing the characters develop.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley for an honest review.

This is the first in a new series from this author, and my first of her books to read. Maybe I’m simply not the audience for cozy mysteries, but the MC was a bit irritating to me (seemed a bit immature at times and also a little bit of a busybody), the murder a bit lame/underwhelming (I felt a bit bad for the victim as NO ONE seemed to care much that she was murdered) and the murderer fairly obvious to me. There was a bit of interesting history included (which seemed to be left as a cliffhanger at the end as enticement for the second book), but overall this did not capture my attention well enough to continue with the series.

Thanks to #NetGalley and #St.Martin’sPress for the ARC. The opinions are all my own.

This is a good start to what may be an entertaining series. I liked the characters. The history was interesting. A hint of romance. Had I been paying attention rather than enjoying the flow of the book I could have figured out the culprits. Nice to be surprised, yet not really surprised.

Murder at the Mansion by Shelia Connolly is the 1st book in the Victorian Village mystery series, and it's off to a good start. Katherine Hamilton is contacted by her high school friend to help with her home town of Asheford, Maryland. The town spent all their resources on a mansion, and the town is now broke. Kate arch enemy in high school, Cordelia, is the person who talked the town into buying the mansion. When Cordelia is found murdered the mystery begins. I really enjoyed this story, and am looking forward to reading about how the town digs out of their hole.

I received this book in exchange for a fair and honest review.

It’s been a number of years since I have read a mystery by Sheila Connolly (I read the Orchard mystery series.) I wasn’t sure how she had progressed as an author in the intervening years but was happy to find that she has grown into her craft. Considering that those earlier books were excellent, it meant that her plot lines and characters have gotten even better than before.

In the debut to this series, Kathleen Hamilton is brought back home again to help save the old hometown. She isn’t the type to look backward but is drawn to both the plight of the town and to the actual project involved.

But, this is a murder mystery and so a body is stumbled upon (almost literally) and thus begins the work of an accidental sleuth. Turns out that Katherine has to help solve the crime before she can deal with the crisis. That the victim was someone who got on every one’s last nerve meant the suspect list was long and deep.

It will be interesting to see where this series is going with regards to the town. So many small towns in the US are lost as people move out and to bigger cities. Even though fictional, I look forward to reading about the steps that one can take to stop and reverse the process.

I was provided a digital advance reader copy of this book by the publisher via Netgalley.

At the beginning of Murder at the Mansion, I wasn't sure that this new series was going to click- I initially found the main character's attitude to be a bit too condescending and snobby (she has a snide thought early in the book about the insignificance of her friend's problems as a stay-at-home mom to those of her life as a so-important single, childless hotel executive). However, throughout the story, Kate's passion for the project of revitalizing Asheford begins to shine, and the story becomes a bit more exciting (and the character seems less awful). As the first book in the series there is a lot of work done to establish the setting and characters, and I think this series has a lot of potential. The addition of historical detail and the idea of reviving Asheford as a historical village makes this series seem enticing. I would definitely be interested in reading the next in this series to see where it goes!

This is a new series but definitely not a debut novel for Sheila Connolly (she is already a nest selling author). I personally haven’t read any of Connolly’s books but I was intrigued by the summary of this one and the fact that it was a brand new series.

Not going to lie the fact that it said ‘Victorian’ in the series title also was a contributing factor. I love all things Victorian and when I saw it in the title I was immediately saying ‘sold’ loudly in my head.

Katherine Hamilton’s goal in high school was to escape from her dead-end hometown of Asheford, Maryland. Fifteen years later she’s got a degree in hospitality management and a great job supervising every aspect of the day-to-day operations of a high-end boutique hotel on the Baltimore waterfront.

Then her high school best friend asks her to come talk with the town leaders of Asheford, but she won’t say why. Kate can’t cut her last link to her past, so she agrees to make the short trip across the state to Asheford.

Once Kate arrives, the town council members reveal that their town is on the verge of going bankrupt, and they’ve decided that Kate’s skills and knowledge make her the perfect person to cure all their ills. The town has used its last available funds to buy the huge Victorian mansion just outside of town, hoping to use it to attract some of the tourists who travel to visit the nearby Civil War battle sites. Kate has less-than-fond memories of the mansion, for personal reasons, but to make matters worse, the only person who has presented a possible alternate plan is Cordelia Walker–Kate’s high school nemesis, who had a hand in driving Kate away from Asheford so many years.

But a few days later Kate receives a call from the police–Cordelia has been found dead on the mansion property, and Kate is all-but certain that her name is high on the suspect list. She finds herself juggling the murder investigation and her growing fascination with the magnificent old house that turns out to be full of long-hidden mysteries itself. Kate knows she must clear her name and save her town–before she ends up behind bars (summary from Goodreads).

The writing in this book is excellent and practiced. It’s evident that Connolly is a seasoned vet when it comes to writing and mysteries. Everything was well thought out and made logical sense. There wasn’t the jumping around or trying to decide what the central theme of the book is going to be, that some newer authors have. With Connolly, she knows what she’s about.

But as with any new series, there are a lot of things happening in this book. There are a lot of characters and plot points to set up as well as the hierarchy of the town and it’s people etc. So just be prepared that there is a lot of set up and ground laying in this book.

I also appreciated the attention to detail regarding the historical period. While this book isn’t necessarily a historical fiction book, there are historical elements, especially in regard to the house. The historical elements, while not the focus, added to the story and made the town interesting and as a historian who loves the Victorian era and did her thesis on the Civil War, this book was a thrill to read.

I suspect that the town will continue to be a focal point in future books. I liked how the author kept that door open because it gave me anticipation for the setting of future books.

This was a good read for me. It did take me a few chapters to get into the overall story but for the most part I found myself interested and eager to keep reading. However one thing I would like to note…..I am not a fan of the cover art. It doesn’t stand out in any way to me. It’s so non descriptive that I feel like it could be for any book. In her other book series, the cover art had a lot of charm to it and I felt disappointed that this book didn’t share the same.

Overall this is a fund little mystery read. I loved the polish of the details and overall story. If you are a cozy mystery fan, then you might want to give this little gem a try!

Challenge/Book Summary:

Book: Murder at the Mansion (Victorian Village Mysteries #1) by Sheila Connolly

Kindle Edition, 304 pages
Expected publication: June 26th 2018 by Minotaur Books
Review copy provided by: Publisher/author in exchange for an honest review

This book counts toward: NA

Hosted by: NA
Books for Challenge Completed: NA
Recommendation: 4 out of 5

Genre: mystery, cozy mystery

Memorable lines/quotes:

This is the first book of the new cozy Victorian Village Mysteries series.

I enjoy Ms Connolly’s series to include the Glassblowing Series as Sarah Atwell. Some more than others but she never disappoints. If you liked the Glassblowing series or the Orchard series, I believe you’ll like this one too.

So, I quickly requested the opportunity to read this novel offered by Netgalley. I received an Advanced Reader’s Copy from Minotaur Books via Netgalley and these are my own opinions.

I was hooked almost immediately. Lisabeth mentions Brownie troops, town needing help due to cash flow issues, and the past week’s storm havic on the community.
Since I recently saw the flood devastation on Ellicott city and reports that store owners may not rebuild, this was a timely point in her book.

I couldn’t get through this book quickly enough. Great writing, plot and character development, and descriptions. Great start to another fantastic series.