I had hoped to like this book. I have been enjoying suspense books a lot as of late. Sadly, Grave Reservations didn't keep my attention. It was all a little too slow for me. I had to add this book to my DNF list. I do hope that others will enjoy and love this book. It just was not for me

Business is not exactly booming for travel agent and inconsistent psychic Leda Foley who is trying to keep her business Foley's Flights of Fancy afloat, but she is managing the best she can. Seattle PD detective Grady Merritt isn't too thrilled when his travel agent changes his flight at the last minute, but it isn't long before he realizes she did it to save his life. As a last ditch effort to solve a cold case he is struggling with, he reaches out to Leda for help. The more Grady and Leda dig, there are signs that a mystery from Leda's past may be connected to Grady's cold case.

Leda, sometimes joined by her best friend Niki, can overwhelm Grady at times, but they make a good team when all is said and done. Leda is not very confident in her psychic abilities, but she is gung ho about helping Grady in his investigation. And if if helps her figure out what happened to her deceased fiancé, all the better. Grady's more practical thoughtful approach balances out Leda's more impulsive one. Their methods and teaming up may be unconventional, but it makes for an entertaining mystery.

Some of my favorite moments took place at the nightclub Castaways where where Leda hones her psychic skills by performing karaoke, singing whatever song come to mind after she touches someone's personal item. While these scenes may not be directly related to the mystery, they offer more insight into Leda's character and that of her growing abilities.

Author Cherie Priest mixes humor, the paranormal, and mystery in the first of a promising new series. I enjoyed the back and forth between the characters and the twists and turns of the mystery. Which is why I did not wait too long before jumping into the second book in the Booking Agents series, Flight Risk.

What a great series!! Opening by saving a life Leda is a psychic and travel agent. She quickly gets involved in solving a murder. I love her relationship with Grady and her best friend Niki. The whole book is interesting and fun to read.

I love love loved this book! Leda is awesome, and Grady better be in the sequel, that’s all I’m saying. Loved the idea of psychic karaoke, and the club was such a good setpiece, I'm already looking forward to reading the second book, and cannot wait to see where this story goes!

Psychic karaoke - yes please! Our heroine, Leda, is a psychic travel agent, which sounds awesome but can cause her some issues when her customers think they want something other than her gift tells her they need. She's also not keen on telling anyone about her gift so explaining why she urdges them to change flights can be challenging, but when she gets a vision of one of her clients' flights exploding she has to warn his not to board and her secret is out. This client just happens to be a Seattle PD Detective who needs help with a cold case that he just can't break. An intriguing msytery, chemistry, an unsolved murder, and the above mentioned Psychic Karaoke combines into the kickoff of a great series. Eagerly waiting for Book 2 Flight Risk.

When Leda Foley struggling travel agent and inconsistent psychic decides to change a return flight for a customer she never imagined where it would lead. Her feeling that she needed to do it ended up being correct when the flight in question catches fire on take off as Grady Merritt stands watching from a window. He was supposed to be on that flight if not for the intervention of his travel agent. Grady happens to be a rather open minded detective who decides to see if Leda’s abilities might be able to help him with a perplexing cold case where a father and son were murdered at a hotel. As her abilities are rather inconsistent she’s hesitant but her best friend Nikki encourages her to give it a try because at worst she finds nothing and has nothing to lose. What she doesn’t expect is for her abilities to not only work at least a little but she also finds that this case is connected to the death of her fiancé years prior. The two of them try to figure out what really happened in both cases and how they might be connected. But as they start asking questions things start getting dangerous for other people. Because the killer thinks they are onto them and is going about cleaning up any lose ends left behind.

I typically don’t often like cozy mysteries but I really liked this one Leda is very likable and so are her friends at the bar where she does her psychic karaoke singing. It was an interesting story.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me a free copy of this book.

This was a fun read for those that are into mystery but also like a bit of light-heartedness to it. Leda is a (somewhat) psychic that gets roped into helping a detective solve a murder mystery. Now, it seems all fun, and it was in the beginning. However, by the time I got the latter half of this book I got bored with the repetitiveness and where the book was going. I finished as I was curious about the murderer and how everything was connected, but at a certain point I was reading to finish the book and not because I was enjoying it.

I am in the minority with this take, as a lot of people seemed to enjoy it. This book has a lot of potential and I definitely enjoyed Leda's character and her interactions. with the detective.

Leda is running a less-than-successful travel agency in Seattle, and has an unpredictable psychic gift. When she has a flash of insight and re-books a police officer's flight which subsequently catches fire, he takes her on as a psychic consultant for an older case that remains unsolved. Since her fiance was murdered and no one was ever charged, she agrees to help with the case. She's also got a second unpaid career as the "Psychic Psongstress," where bar patrons give her an object, and she sings a song based on the vibe she gets. If you are looking for a mystery with humor and likable characters, Grave Reservations would be a good choice. Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the opportunity to review this book.
advance-review-copy

This is an entertaining introduction to novice psychic and travel agent Leda Foley. Leda has always had psychic ‘flashes’ that have never led to meaningful predictions or interventions until she prevents Seattle police detective, Grady Merritt, from getting on a plane that he watches crash as it leaves the runway. The two team up to unofficially investigate multiple unsolved murders. This book is well written, filled with quirky characters and has an interesting storyline. Throughout this unconventional investigation Leda explores the boundaries of her psychic abilities, gains understanding of how they work and becomes a bit more confident and trusting of those abilities. This was an enjoyable read!

I've read several books by Cherie Priest and enjoyed every one, and this one was no exception. It was a fantastic read, and I'd totally recommend it to friends.

If it's a mystery and it's quirky, I know I'm going to love it, and this book did not disappoint. Leda is a travel agent who is also psychic, but not in a consistent way. When she has a bad feeling about a customer's flight and rebooks it without permission, she sets in play a series of events she didn't see coming (pun intended). Her customer, a Seattle police detective, is intrigued by Leda's actions after the plane he was supposed to be on blows up on the runway. After meeting her in person, he realizes her "gut feelings" could be just the help he needs to solve a cold case that haunts him. An unlikely detecting team, but the juxtaposition works! Supported by a cast of unique and loveable characters, Leda and Grady hunt for clues that just might solve not one cold case, but two. I loved this odd duo, and Leda is a fresh take on a quirky heroine. Highly recommend!

I thoroughly enjoyed this read and plan on reading the second one in the series. It wasn’t too intense, a fun and easy read which was a breath of fresh air.

Foley’s Flights of Fancy is struggling. Not many people need a travel agent in this day and age but owner Leda Foley is doing her best to keep the business afloat all while using her psychic abilities for Klairvoyant Karaoke. When Leda uses her abilities to save Detective Grady from a doomed flight, he asks Leda to to help him in solving a cold case. The cold case might just hit a little too close to home for Leda, as she struggles to come to term with her boyfriend’s murder three years earlier.

This book was such a fun and entertaining read with plenty of laugh out loud moments. Leda heads up a group of quirky characters and I loved every single one. Especially Leda’s hot mess express of a bestfriend.

This was the perfect type of cozy mystery to me. It was a bit over the top the way Finlay Donovan is, but it wasn’t too over the top or cutesy that it makes you cringe. I’ve never read anything else of Cherie Priest, but this book is making me want to pick up some of her previous books. I can’t wait for the second book to come out!

If you need a fun and easy mystery this series is it! I promise you’ll fly through this one.


Grave Reservations is out now! Huge thank you to Atria for my advanced copy in exchange for my honest opinion. If you liked this review please let me know either by commenting below or by visiting my instagram @speakingof_books.

Leda Foley is a travel agent blessed with a special gift. She can see into the future. Which came in rather handy, having saved the life of a certain Seattle detective, ensuring he misses a doomed flight. She also moonlights doing clairvoyant karaoke (who knew there was such a thing!) at her favorite watering hole.

This is a fun mystery which includes a psychic. I found this fun and the characters were well developed. This sounds like it is going to be a series and I am looking forward to the second book. This is a quirky entertaining read.

I was given a copy by Atria Books and NetGalley. My opinions are my own.

This is a cozy mystery and I enjoyed it. I found many parts of the book unpredictable and at times I found the characters to be unlikable, which contributes to my rating.

This was such a fun read. I really enjoyed all the characters and this was the perfect lighthearted read.

I really enjoyed this one. It was funny, entertaining, and kept wanting more. Will definitely read more by this author.

Leda Foley is a gifted psychic, but she can’t always access her gift when she wants nor can she always clearly interpret the messages she receives. Instead, she is proprietor of Flights of Fancy, a fledgling travel agency.

In her role as travel agent, she rebooks Seattle PD detective Grady Merritt’s flight home. Merritt is quite perturbed by Leda’s unauthorized change—until he watches his original plane blow up from the safety of the gate.

Desperate to solve a cold case and with seeming proof of Led’s psychic abilities, Merritt requests her help investigating a murder. Reluctantly, she agrees, realizing that an inside connection at the police department may help her find her fiancé’s killer: when he was murdered three years ago, her abilities were of no use.

As the two work collaborate, slowly developing a sense of trust, they begin to see how the two unsolved cases may wend together.

I’m not sure I would have liked a mystery about a confident, skillful psychic helping the police, but I found Leda very endearing. Her gift is undeniable yet mysterious and uncontrollable which makes her feel vulnerable. To help come to some understanding of her power, she started Klairvoyant Karaoke, a show at her best friend’s nightclub, in whichh she sings whatever song comes to her when she holds a personal object from a volunteer. These were some of the funniest and sweetest scenes.

While Priest used some techniques to explain the way Merritt was able to bring on a “consultant,” GRAVE RESERVATIONS does require some suspension of disbelief, especially when not only does Lena but also her best friend Niki, join Merritt interviewing witnesses. At the same time, I found it worth it for the original concept, likable characters, and interesting mystery. I’m also fond of books set in Seattle.

The end of the book hints at a possible series. My fingers are crossed!

I just completed an ARC of Grave Reservations by Cherie Priest from NetGalley. I have read several books by this author (Eden Moore series) and loved them. This one was much lighter and Ms. Priest states this was deliberate in her acknowledgments. I liked the darker stuff better. This was fun and I enjoyed it and I liked so many elements, especially the psychic aspects. But even though this was fun I don’t think I will continue the series - I like my thrillers a little more dark and gritty. I think this goes well with thrillers by Elle Cosimano and May Cobb. If you love those you will love this too.

Thanks to Netgalley, Atria publishers,and Cheri Priest for this ARC. I love Cheririest and her horror books, so I guess this one just threw me off, as it’s pretty mellow. I didn’t care for this book for that reason, but I will continue to read her horror books… I still gave it 5 stars on Goodreads, because it is Cheri Priest , one of my favorite authors.