3.5⭐️ - I wanted to love this one so badly. The entire concept of solving your own murder is something I thought was so fascinating and a fresh new idea but the last third of the book felt very drawn out. Very like-able characters in a cozy town but probably won’t continue with the series.

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC!!

It’s 1965 and teenager Frances Adams has just gotten been told a prediction that will change the course of her life: she’s going to be murdered. Frances spends the rest of her life trying to solve her own murder that hasn’t even happened yet, only to be proved right 60 years later. In present day, her great-niece, Annie, has been called to Frances’ country estate for a meeting. When Annie arrives, however, she finds Frances newly dead.

Told in alternating timelines between Annie working to solve her great-aunt’s murder and Frances’ diary from the 1960s, this book kept me guessing up until the very end. Unfortunately, it seems almost everyone in the quaint village of Castle Knoll might have had a reason to kill Frances, but by digging to find the murderer and with the clock ticking, is Annie allowing herself to become a target?

I really enjoyed the dual timelines and thought this book was well done. I’m always happy to pick up a mystery that I’m not able to solve halfway through. There are a lot of characters to keep straight, especially between the two timelines, but the continuity of a few of Frances’ friends made this story even more enjoyable. I’m hopeful we will see more books to follow this one as great-aunt Frances absolutely left enough unopened files and diaries to continue to keep us guessing. Thank you to Penguin Group Dutton and NetGalley for providing me with this ARC.

I really enjoyed reading this book and I am looking forward to the next book in the series. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the advance copy of this book.

I really enjoyed this unique dual-timeline mystery! I'm glad it's the first in a series.

*Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an e-galley in exchange for an honest review.

I really enjoyed this one. It was a fun whodunit type mystery with a lots of characters to choose from as the murderer. I also enjoyed the past and present timeline. This definitely falls under the more cozy side of mysteries as it didn't have that edge of your seat suspense, but was intelligent and entertaining throughout.

What an absolute gem of a book! Loads of characters but easily kept track of, this story had me from the first page. Annie was such a great sleuth and had a real reason to solve the mystery of who murdered her great aunt but the money was secondary to her need to learn about her great aunt Frances's history, which was so intriguing. I loved reading Frances's diary along with Annie and I had a hard time deciding which timeline I enjoyed more because they were both steeped in mystery. If this indeed the start of a series, I couldn't be happier!

This book had a lot going on. There were a ton of characters and sometimes I had trouble keeping them all straight. I lost steam about halfway through, but wanted to know who did it. I was disappointed in the ending. I felt like we didn't really building up to who the killer was, but the author just decided this is who it would be and forced it in. Not my favorite mystery I've read.

This is such a good little murder mystery. Following Annie as she solves Frances’s murder is both interesting and sad, because you can tell how well they would have gotten along if they’d known each other. There were so many layers to the mystery and to Castle Knoll, that the end did actually manage to surprise me. Something I can’t often say about thrillers. Definitely give this one a read if you like a cozy mystery with just a hint of the slightly less cozy at the solve. I would absolutely read a prequel where Frances is solving Emily’s disappearance. I found myself enjoying the parts that were diary entries from Frances the most.

Obsessed with a fortune presented to her at a young age, Frances spends her life solving mysteries in an attempt to discover who will be the one to murder her and make her fortune come true. When she turns up dead, her niece is her only hope at justice. Armed with a her aunt Frances’ teenage diary and a knack for writing mysteries herself, Annie embarks on a sleuthing adventure to unearth her aunt’s killer.

Although I did connect the dots on who the murderer was before the ending, I really enjoyed this story. The author does a good job of making every character involved present as seemingly guilty. The dual timeline provided a good insight into Frances’ life while Annie is tracing her steps in the present day. I look forward to the series continuing.

If this wasn't a lovely read! I wasn't sure what to expect with this book, but it was a nice surprise. Frances is read a fortune at age 17, telling her of her impending murder that will take place 60 years later. She is paranoid & weary of all those around her. She keeps meticulous records & journals to assist in this murder that will take place.

Current day, it is up to Annie, Great Aunt Frances's great niece, to solve her murder in order to receive Frances's inheritance. This story weaves together so nicely and the supporting characters keep you questioning.... who murdered Great Aunt Frances?

I highly recommend this book to anyone looking for a murder mystery vibe in their next read!

Thanks go to NetGalley & Dutton for the advance copy of this lovely book. Pub date March 26, 2024.

I actually did not finish this book. I felt the writing was good but it just wasn’t what I expected. I think the title is a bit misleading. I am sure it is a great book, as I’ve seen a couple of my friends review it and say they enjoyed it. But it just wasn’t for me. For this reason, I will not be posting any reviews of this book online.

Really enjoyable lighter mystery. The pieces all worked together to lead to the mystery and the side/small mysteries lead into the overall mystery with out sidetracking the reader. The only challenge was keeping track of the family lines and how everyone was connected to each other.

In the 1960s, when Frances was a teenager, a fortune-teller gave her an eerie prophecy, and ever since, she has been obsessed with the idea that she will someday be murdered. In the present day, Annie is summoned to her eccentric great-aunt Frances's estate to discuss her inheritance – something Annie expected to go to her mother – only to find that Frances has suddenly died. Now, Annie, an aspiring mystery writer, is left to solve the murder while competing against other prospective inheritors to see who can piece the puzzle together first.

This was fine but for some reason didn’t hold my attention very well until the middle. Once I was into it, though, I really enjoyed it. It was interesting to switch back and forth between the present and the past via Frances’s diary. It seems like this is going to become a series, and I liked this one enough that I’ll probably seek out the next!

There is a part where a grown man has sexual and romantic relationships with 17-year-old girls, but 17 is above the age of consent in the UK, so I’m not sure if it merits a content warning or not but I thought I’d still mention it here.

CW: domestic violence

This books got me out of my reading slump! I really liked how it was different that other murder mystery's in the sense that they didn't have a "who done it" moment in some parlor and their was a race to solve the murder with a prize in the end. I would love to have known more about the house and the other things the aunt was involved with over the years. Hopefully this becomes a series.

This fresh update to the "solve my murder to gain an inheritance" trope is so well done. The 1960s disappearance of their third has plagued the remaining two members of a BFF trio, with Frances being consumed by her friend's disappearance after a tarot card reader's disastrous fortune. She's been regarded as the village kook ever since.

Annie is en route to meet great-aunt Frances who is, as the title suggests, murdered. Annie uses her murder mystery author skills to solve the mystery, through twists and turns, and the disappearance to boot. As an aficianado, I was surprised at the actual murderer! Here's to waiting eagerly for Kristen Perrin to craft more of these mysteries.

SYNOPSIS: A teenager and her two best friends go to a fortune teller who predicts that Frances will be murdered someday. This begins a lifetime of paranoia and a massive amount of dirt on everyone in the rural English countryside town she lives in. No one takes the prediction seriously and after sixty years (and many major life events) Annie Adams receives the news that her great aunt Frances is changing her will to include her in it. She must leave right away to hear how things will change, but when she gets to the town of Castle Knoll, she finds Frances murdered in her mansion. Now Annie, with the help of her great-aunt’s personal journal, is left to solve the mystery in a hurry all the while becoming suspicious of almost every person in the little town.

MY THOUGHTS: First of all, THAT TITLE! I was hooked based on the title and the description of this book. Unfortunately, it fell short for me. When you read the blurb on the back of the book, you hope that it doesn’t take much to get past the main plot, but I think this book was probably a hundred pages too long. The pace was slow and I wished that it was just done better. It wasn’t that the writing was bad–I actually quite liked it. Although we find the body fairly quickly, it takes a third of the book to get moving…slowly. The last 15-20% of the book was much more entertaining, and I really did want to know what happened. The ending was difficult to guess because there was a whole town–and I mean like 10-15 characters–that could have been involved in this murder. The cast of characters was hard to keep track of, but in the end if you like a good Agatha Christie novel or a riveting game of Clue, this one might be for you!

I loved this story and I can't wait to read more in the series. I enjoyed the back and forth between timelines as the main character searches for clues regarding not just one, but two murders. I'm interested to see where the series goes!

~Thanks to Netgalley for providing a digital ARC of How to Solve Your Own Murder in exchange for an honest review. ~

A funky laid out cozy mystery!

I heard for fans of Knives Out and requested this on Netgalley, but I didn’t realize we would also be getting excerpts from Frances, our victim, herself, specifically in the form of diary entries that were her way of trying to solve what happened to a childhood friend that disappeared at 17. I really liked the Frances we met in these chapters. She’s not the most outspoken, but she stands up for herself and what she believes is right. Oh and the fact that Frances has two giant murder boards in her house? Kind of just makes me like this kooky old lady even more.

On the opposite side, we have Annie, who is a bit of a Jessica Day sort of protagonist. She’s quirky, having been raised by a single mother who’s a somewhat accomplished artist in London, and recently started trying to turn her passion for writing into a career. Though she’s never actually met Frances, she still feels a connection to the mysterious great-aunt. I quite liked how she starts sleuthing by thinking “Well if I were writing a murder mystery…” Having an investigating character with a phobia of any and all things medical was an interesting choice and the way she put herself in danger for the climax was a bit of a shaking-my-head moment.

This definitely had my intrigue skyrocketing, particularly when we began to see many characters between the two timelines. I actually read this pretty fast, because once the layout had been set, I couldn’t stop myself! I had so many questions and was so curious to figure out how things would intertwine between the two timelines!

Unfortunately, I do think this suffered from too many characters between the two timelines. Though the setup was original, there was a huge cast to keep track of. Even so, I did guess the perpetrator in the current timeline a little too easy, but I was pleasantly surprised at the past one.

This is listed as the start of a new mystery series and I’m honestly not sure how or where the series will progress from this ending? But I am a bit intrigued to find out.

What a wonderful read!! This mystery was cozy, fresh and unique, and also quite riveting! Unlike any mystery I have read before, I loved the idea of solving your own murder. This book made me laugh and smile but also at times question everything that was going on! The main character was likeable and I loved the connection of the murdered being her great aunt because I had a close relationship with my great aunt. I definitely recommend this book to all readers - it is a fast read but amazing quality and I am so glad I picked it up!

Not terribly memorable or unusual, but a solidly plotted dual timeline mystery.

The premise for this one was better in theory than on execution, but it works well enough and the story moves well in both timelines. I liked the characters well enough, though neither of the protagonists strike me as anyone I’ll remember with any specificity a year or so from now.

This book probably needed more atmosphere and sense of place, particularly in the second timeline, and it’s definitely overloaded on dialogue. That does make the book read faster, but it also makes for a book better tailored to a different audience than the type that typically seeks out this type of mystery.