What a ride this book was! A unique storyline, fleshing out Frances and Annie's story to solve a murder.

Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC of this book. I don't read too many cozy little mysteries, but I enjoyed this one. The premise was pretty unbelievable, and at times I got lost in all the characters, but overall it was a good read!

Thank you NetGalley, Penguin Group, and Kristen Perrin for the free ARC.
How to Solve Your Own Murder is a book that follows Annie Adams, who just inherited her Great Aunt Agnes' sprawling country estate in Castle Knoll on the premise that she solve her Aunt Agnes' murder. The book was very cleverly written and alternates between present day and teenage Agnes in 1965.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book and finished it in one day. The characters were very enjoyable, the storyline was intriguing, and it kept me guessing throughout the entire story. It had elements of a thriller, cozy mystery, and friendship all rolled into one and it left me excited for book 2. I can't wait to see what Annie and Castle Knoll gets up to next!!

Thank you to NetGalley for an eARC in exchange for review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.


I really wanted to like this book more. It dragged for far too long. We follow Annie, who finds out at the reading of her Great Aunt Frances’ will that there will be a “Knives Out” like competition for the house and inheritance. Great Aunt Frances always thought she’d be murdered, so the family listed in her will must compete against each other and the town’s detective, solving the murder within one week of her death or the house goes to a local realtor who wants to sell the house and land. Should be fun and interesting.

We spent almost all of the novel reading Frances’ diaries from her teenage years in the 1960s and the murder of her childhood friend. While the idea of solving two murders, one historical and one recent, seems like a challenge, I felt like we didn’t really see any investigative work from anyone. None of the small things were big enough to mean much. The ending felt rushed and told to us versus us solving the mystery with Annie.

I really enjoyed this modern whodunnit. Annie is unexpectedly summoned by her rich great aunt Frances to discuss a potential future inheritance, and almost immediately she is tasked with solving a murder on a short time line. I’ve seen some reviews that say this is for fans of Knives Out or Agatha Christie, which is for sure accurate, but I also kept getting old school Clue vibes along with the Guy Ritchie Netflix series The Gentleman. The tight deadline to solve the murder means this book is fast-paced, and the complexity of blending the past and present doesn’t give much time for character development, but it leaves the door wide open for a sequel - one I would definitely read.

How to Solve Your Own Murder is a unique and inventive take on a murder mystery. When Annie is summoned to the town of Castle Knoll by a great-aunt she’s never met, she unexpectedly finds herself in the middle of not one, but two murder investigations. Her great-aunt Frances is killed before she has the chance to meet her, and Annie is propelled into a strange game set up by Frances in her will to find her murderer. Along the way, Frances’ diary leads Annie into the mystery of the disappearance of Frances’ teenage friend in 1966. I enjoyed the twists and turns of this dual timeline mystery. The story was well-plotted and the characters were engaging. Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC.

I'm always down for a good murder mystery. I definitely enjoyed How to Solve Your Own Murder by Kristen Perrin. We are introduced to Annie who wants to meet her great-aunt but ends up trying to solve her murder. We are given clues along the way and seemingly help Annie to solve the mystery.

I thought the jumping between timelines of present day and 1965 was a really interesting aspect to the book. It added to the puzzle that we had to solve and it created an interesting character to match to Annie's now deceased great-aunt. Kristen Perrin did a great job with character development, with little eggs to make you wonder about their intent throughout the entire book. I do think that the beginning few chapters were a little slow for my taste, but it got pretty fast paced and I do like that it kept me guessing all the way through.

Thank you to NetGalley, Penguin Group Dutton, and Kristen Perrin for the eARC of How to Solve Your Own Murder in exchange for an honest review. Publication date for How to Solve Your Own Murder by Kristen Perrin was 26 March 2024. Rated down for 4.5 Stars.

I could not wait for this book to finish. It didn’t get interesting until about 25% into it, and even then it just felt like a cozy mystery to me. The characters weren’t that interesting and didn’t give me a reason to care for them at all. The idea behind this story was good, I just don’t think it was executed very well. I did like how chapters flipped between the present and the great aunts diary about what happened in the past and about her “fortune” but other than that it felt like clue and trying to figure out who in the house did it and eliminating each character. This was not for me, I need way more drama, suspense and more of a psychological thriller than a cozy mystery.

If a cozy mystery is more your thing then I think you would definitely like this book!!

I am so glad that this book is the first in a series, because I want to read and learn more about these characters. That's not to say that the book felt unfinished, everything wrapped up nicely at the end. I thoroughly enjoyed the puzzle of trying to figure out not just the current murder, but the one from the past as well. Overall a great first book in the series!

Annabelle (or Annie to her friends) has been summoned to see her Great Aunt Frances to talk about a change in the will. One where apparently her mother was taken out and she was placed in it. Only, she had never actually met the woman. And she was murdered just before they were to meet. Oh, and Great Aunt Frances was obsessed with a fortune she received when she was a teenager about her future murder, and whoever can solve the mystery gets to inherit everything. Just a couple of small details there.

I really wanted to enjoy this because the premise seems right up my alley but this just couldn't keep me engaged. Maybe i'll revisit this down the line but sadly I wasn't enjoying this as much as i thought.

Who doesn't love a good murder mystery? This story involves Annie, who is trying to solve the murder of her gran-aunt. I loved that the story takes you through the clues, so it's almost as if you're trying to solve the murder along with Annie. The story does involve a lot of characters and it does switch between two timeliness, so it can become a little confusing for the reader. I was able to guess the murder before the ending, but overall I enjoyed this book.

📖 Book Review 📖

📱🎧” How to Solve Your Own Murder” by Kristen Perrin

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Frances Adams believes she will be murdered and spends her life and her fortune trying to prevent it. Her great-niece luckily enjoys a puzzle as to gain her inheritance she must solve the death, and determine if it really was a murder.

Jumping from present day to 1965, when Frances was a teenage, readers learn about a fortune-teller who predicts the demise of Frances in a very coded poem, causing Frances to spend her life trying to solve a crime that has not even occurred. Paranoid of the future she digs up gossip and dirt on everyone just to have something in case they are her killer. This odd behavior caused no one to take her serious until she is found murdered in her late 70s. Annie Adams is a mystery writer. She knows of her odd, wealthy, reclusive great-aunt, but until she is required to attend a meeting at Frances’
English country estate she doesn’t really know her. Frances is sadly found dead before Annie arrives but now Annie has a puzzle and Frances left lots of secrets/lies/motives behind for Annie to follow.
 
As Annie gets closer to the truth, via an old diary of Frances’, which shows Rose and Emily, her best friends in not the best light, Annie is putting the pieces together.

Fast paced and kept me guessing at every turn, plus filled with such unique characters- from the police, to a nephew, a old lawyer, and a married couple who manage the estate means there was a lot of people who could have wanted to kill great aunt Frances.


#somanybooks #readsomemore #audiobooks #bookstagram #bookrecommendations #readersofinstagram #readmorebooks #booklover #bookishlove #readersgonnaread #bookishaf

Touted as perfect "For fans of Knives Out and The Thursday Murder Club", How to Solve Your Own Murder is a dual timeline story that follows Annie Adams in present-day trying to solve a possible murder and her Great Aunt Frances as a teenager in 1965 when her lifelong obsession with a fortune given to her at a local fair begins.

This book might as well be in the dictionary next to the definition of a cozy mystery. I’ve seen some critical feedback suggesting that it reads like a middle-grade book (as if that were a bad thing!). I, however, loved the straightforward mystery without gore or extreme tension. I think Annie would get along well with the members of The Thursday Murder Club.

Thank you to NetGalley and Dutton for the opportunity to read. All opinions are my own.

4 out of 5 stars.

How to Solve Your Own Murder was a who done it lovers dream. This book gripped me from the very beginning. I loved following the main characters journey trying to solve the murder. The flash back journal entries were my favorite part. Getting a personal glimpse in the past did wonders for this book. I will say a lot of stuff felt very convenient for our main character. But overall I really enjoyed this one. I can’t wait to read the next book in the series.
4/5 Stars

Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for sending me an arc copy in exchange for my honest opinion.

SPOILERS AHEAD. This was a fun mystery with interesting characters that kept me engaging and guessing. My only criticism is *SPOILER ALERT* that I didn't even remember who the murderer was when it was revealed. That character in particular needed to be more developed to make the mystery more satisfying.

A young aspiring writer, an eccentric murdered great-aunt, a quaint village and luxurious estate, and an extensive cast of characters with skeletons in their closets make up this page-turning mystery.

In 1965 a teenage Francis Adams attends an English country fair with her friends, where a fortune teller offers an eerie prediction of her murder. This sets Francis on a life-long paranoid investigation of who might be plotting her demise.

In the present day, Annie Adams is summoned to a meeting at the estate of her great-aunt Frances, only to discover that her aunt's fear of being murdered has unfortunately come true. Annie is given days to unravel the mystery in order to inherit the estate, and quickly finds herself in the depths of danger from various characters with much to hide.

The premise of this book was so promising, but then the execution wasn't quite there. The glamorous old estate setting was fun, as was the idea of having a short time frame to solve the murder and win the inheritance. The story was entertaining, but none of the characters were particularly likable or interesting, and the primary narrator writing mystery books while seeming to have no actual knowledge of investigative procedure was a little inexplicable. I did enjoy trying to predict the outcome amid a myriad of clues, and I think this story would be fun as a film with the visual impact of the setting.

Thank you so much to Dutton and Netgalley for this book!

This book was super fun, while i did get very confused because there was so many different characters and multiple things happening it was still fun! I love the multiple time frames and going between present & past times. I just wish I could follow what character is what more, since there’s the last character that are in the present and also present characters. Thank you NetGalley for the arc of this book!

A lot of times I really don't like it when the blurb on a book describes it as being reminiscent of popular books or movies because they almost never live up to the height. But I honestly think that comparing "How to Solve Your Own Murder" to the movie "Knives Out" is fairly accurate.

The book is a murder mystery that spans a couple of decades and includes not just one, but two, murders that need to be solved. I liked how the timelines were interwoven, with most of the past reveals being through journal entries. I also really liked the main cast of characters though some of the side characters did start to blur a bit for me by the time we reached the end of the series.

Overall I really did like this book and would likely want to read more if this really does become a series as was hinted in in the book.

This is more of a 4.5 than a 5, but the fact is the story lingers in one’s consciousness. Great twist, didn’t see it coming. Nice use of past/present juxtaposition. Definitely has the “Thursday Murder Club” vibes but with a younger sexier cast of characters and a meaty backstory that makes up old lore in quaint English towns. Many thanks to NetGalley for the ARC and independent review.

This was a really good, I really enjoyed it. Frances goes to this fair with her two friends and goes to see a fortune teller. The fortune teller predicts Frances murder so now Frances is spends all this time trying to solve a crime that hasn't yet happened. I thought this was really good and a really fun read.