Really enjoyed this. A brilliant read and a great ending. Did not except that ending at all. Looking forward to the other adventures of Edie York and I hope she gets a nice ending with Lou!

I don’t know the precise history of “cozy mysteries” but I have noticed an uptick in publishing what I would describe as charming British murder mysteries and “Murder in the Blitz” is another entry in that category. I can see the odes to Agatha Christie; but it’s also just modern enough to not feel dusty– Grandma *and* Gen-Z would both find something to like, I think. Edie is a scrappy young thing trying to become a crime reporter in WWII who gets embroiled in a mystery involving a mysterious shooting, a missing painting, and three young men who intrigue and frustrate her. I liked Edie and her crew of friends, and I look forward to more adventures.

A really good new historical cozy mystery! As the subtitle says, it really is “a completely addictive” mystery, and I hope to read more about Edie in the future.

We’re in Manchester, England, in 1940. 24 year old Edie York is a girl Friday/secretary at newspaper The Chronicle, with aspirations to become a “real” (crime) reporter, due to her life-long infatuation with mystery novels. Since all the men of the right age are being shipped off to fight in the war, she’s hoping to get her chance, but unfortunately sexism means that useless, decripit male reporters are being called back from retirement to work for the newspaper instead. Finally, the editor gives her a chance to become an “obituarist”, a newly minted job with the goal of cranking up morale on the homefront by publishing a series of heart-warming portraits of recently dead people that contributed to the city Manchester. Her first assignment is to write a piece about recently deceased businessman Joseph Novak, a Jewish refugee. Before she gets started, however, one of the journalists who has recently come back to work and spends most of his time pottering about the office and the local pub, talks her into covering for him for an unimportant News item about the Home Guard’s new uniforms. Edie visits the training mission when suddenly one of the men drops dead, as it turns out by a gunshot wound from an unidentified source… Edie starts to investigate the dead man, Edward Turnbull, with the aim to write an obituary about him, but quickly runs up against many puzzling facts which somehow seems connected to Joseph Novak.

This is more of a “what happened” than a “whodunnit” since both the reader and Edie spends most of the novel trying to figure out if a crime has been committed, and if so, which/what crime. Two more people end up dead after Edie’s interviews about Turnbull and Novak, and she is starting to believe she is jinxed, but that it is all connected somehow.

This is such a well-written mystery, with three-dimensional characters, good dialogue and some interesting twists and turns. Somehow it manages to be both a cozy and quite realistic. The depiction of wartime England is great, and FL Everett gets all the ittybitty historical details right. I really liked the fact that for once in a historical cozy, most of the main characters are not upper-middleclass or upperclass. Edie is an orphan who has grown up in an orphanage, and though she had the brains to go to college had to opt out to earn her living. She shares a tiny flat with her best friend Annie, a harassed war nurse, and during the novel makes friends with undertaker Arnold and his pal DI Louis Brennan, a left-wing veteran from the war in Spain. When Joseph Novak’s posh mistress Lilian Emerson and her son Charles, an Oxford student working “in intelligence”, show up, they stand out with their Edwardian villa and drawing-room manner, and Edie is swept off her feet both by Charles’ good looks and with her longing for that kind of world and security. Edie is funny, spunky and smart, but also sweet, unassuming and young.

Highly recommended!
I received an advance reading copy from netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

This is the first in a WW2 historical mystery series set in Manchester by FL Everett, featuring 24 year old Edie York, sharing a flat in Fallowfield with close friend, Annie, working at the Manchester Chronicle. Edie has been at the paper since she was 19, in a secretarial position, feeling overworked and underpaid, she dreams of being a real crime journalist. It is December 1940, called into the editor, Mr Gorringe's office, a fearful Edie is expecting to be fired, only to be over the moon when she is promoted to obituarist instead with the patriotic purpose of highlighting some noteworthy local people. She is to begin with the recently deceased Joseph Novak, a German Jewish refugee who learnt the language, married, and went on to do well.

However, his widow Pamela is unwilling to co-operate, leaving her struggling to get the necessary information to write the obituary. Constantly forgetting her gas mask, Edie finds herself with the Home Guard, on the spot when a local teacher is shot dead, initially it is not clear what exactly happened. She meets DI Louis Brennan at a dance, through a contact she established with friendly funeral director, Arnold Whiting, hoping for inside information on the investigation. Before Edie knows it, she has stumbled across a horrifying murder that appears to connect Novak, a missing painting, and the shooting of the teacher. Edie is hoping for an exclusive that will establish her as a journalist, there are other murders, as she finds herself surrounded by danger, will she live to write her exclusive?

I have to admit it took me a little while before I became immersed in the story, but once I did, I could not stop reading until I had finished. There is rationing and food shortages, of having to make do and mend, Edie is young and naive, with little experience of the world, which blinds her to the terrors that are to come her way. SImultaneously, she is caught up in the horrors of war that has industrial Manchester heavily bombed, sheltering in a cellar during the scary air raids. There are dead bodies amidst the rubble, buildings and homes demolished, hospitals overwhelmed, all of which has Edie volunteering to do what she can to support the war effort. Everett gives us a well researched historical novel that is wonderfully informative of what happened to Manchester during WW2. Many thanks to the publisher for an ARC.

Great book! I’ve been on a kick about reading murder mystery stories and this one definitely hit the spot. Just enough of everything to satisfy my reading need. Can’t wait to read more by F.L. Everett. Thank you, Netgalley for the ARC. I throughly enjoyed this one.

This is an amazing book, just buy it, and sit back and enjoy the ride. A massive five shiny stars from me. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Edie York is a pistol! Orphaned and raised in a children's home, she has had the one dream to become a crime reporter. Only men have that distinction at this time but with the war on, she feels she might have her chance. She thinks witnessing a possible murder or solving the mystery will give her an opportunity to do some reporting. What a great character. She's inquisitive, determined, and just a touch clueless. I loved watching her try to figure this thing out. I'm looking forward to more Edie York Mysteries.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read this book.

A well written and researched story from the 1940's. I appreciated that for a change this was not set in London but Manchester and it was very well described so you could almost feel you were there. The mystery was a bit too easy to solve although Edie seemed to struggle to get there. Hopefully this was just to show her inexperience so she will improve as a crime solver. I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

It’s as if someone took Mrs Bird and transported it to Manchester! Not that I’m complaining as I loved that series and welcome new additions to light hearted reads

Thank you to Bookouture and NetGalley for the ARC of Murder in the Blitz.

I appreciate that this was a book with the blitz as the background that didn't take place solely in London. Often times I do find historical cozy mystery series to only take place in a centrally renowned location - London, New York, etc. Manchester, a manufacturing/factory city, was a high-level target for bombing, and it was both relevant and refreshing to see a differently affected area with less social expectations than those normally written about with London. F.L. Everett's research into the setting and times felt accurate and appropriate - and made me interested in the overall history of December 1940 in Manchester.

For the actual story, Edie York longs to be a crime reporter, a role that women can not yet achieve. When she is given the opportunity to write obituaries for higher profile Manchester residents, she is ready to dig in in on the first assignment - the obituary of Joseph Novak, but before she can visit his widow, she witnesses another death that may be connected - and now she's on the case hoping for her first big break.

I wanted to love this book - the only other cozy mystery series I've read with the blitz as the background is the Electra McDonnell series by Ashley Weaver (definitely recommend), and the only other reporter lead character cozy I've read is Kate Belli's Gilded Gotham mystery series (also recommend). Unfortunately, I was just frustrated with Edie for most of the book, and I felt like the killer was overwhelmingly obvious and at times was so in your face in reading that I could not justify Edie being a mystery/crime solving enthusiast when the clues are practically slapping her and she can't discern them. I felt like the mystery written about in the book blurb vs the actual story were quite different than each other - and the blurb part seems relevant the first 30% of the book, but after that it seems to get tangled and move in an entirely opposite direction. Edie goes from a woman trying to get up the journalism ladder and make a bit more money to have more heat and food, to someone who is only thinking about her boyfriend, and is constantly forgiving him even though all he ever seems to do is disparage her for her "lowly" upbringing. That said, the ending does give Edie a moment to showcase her bravery and her sleuthing, so it ends satisfactorily, but I don't know if the first 30% and last 10% were enough for me to be interested in book two of the series. I may change my mind when I learn about the second book of the series - perhaps the first book is just the beginning of growth for Edie and her small group of friends.

I also just wanted to note that there is another series called "Murders in the Blitz" with a main character named Eve Duncan - which briefly did cause some confusion for me with "Murder in the Blitz" and a main character named Edie. Julia Underwood's series does appear first in a Goodreads search over F.L. Everett.

1940 and the war is in full swing. In Manchester Edie is working at a newspaper typing and doing a variety of jobs in an era where " you can't possibly be a reporter, you are female". When some are called to fight and others plead reserved occupation, Edie is called into the office. She is terrified that she will lose her job but gets a welcome surprise when she is given the job of obituarist, to write about someone's life who is recently deceased. Her editor had chosen that someone but in trying to find out more about them Edie inadvertently steps into a possible murder enquiry.
I loved this from the outset. There’s an entertaining light hearted element to this and the skill of writing a character that I quickly took to. I rapidly felt in the heart of wartime Manchester in a good way and the mystery that Edie found herself drawn to solving. There is an excellent balance between respect for the events of the war with the trauma people found themselves in and the entertainment of the plot. A cleverly thought out plot and one that left me with a smile and wanting more- I look forward to the next in the series. A brilliantly entertaining read.

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Extremely entertaining and pacey WWII-set murder mystery. Good period detail and convincing descriptions of Manchester's Blitz.

It's winter 1940 and junior journo Edie's long-held wish to be a crime reporter doesn't look like it will come true any time soon. She witnesses an accident/murder/suicide while reporting on the activities of the Home Guard, and a promotion to obituary writer sees her involved in a complicated string of puzzling events with more deaths to come. It rains a lot, she's always forgetting her gas-mask, and she's perpetually cold and wanting more sugar for her tea. Lou the DI is annoying, Arnold the undertaker is potentially odd, and posh boy Charles is stupidly handsome. Can any of them help her solve this mystery?

This is the first book in a series and I look forward to the next one.

Many thanks to Kim Nash at Bookouture for enabling me to read an early copy of Murder in the Blitz by F L Everett. Once I started this, I just couldn’t stop. I loved Edie’s interactions with her various friends, work colleagues and companions, and the depiction of Manchester during WW2. Reading this book felt like watching a deliciously nostalgic Sunday night drama on TV and I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it. Delighted to see that there will be more to come of Edie and Lou - they’re definitely a couple to keep an eye on. Anyone who likes cosy WW2 crime will fall for Murder in the Blitz!