This book is an automatic 5 star read for me! I enjoy everything about this book from the characters like Eleanor and Harper to the setting of Italy to the author adding footnotes every couple of pages!

This entire book was funny and exciting! I didn’t see the twist coming!

If you enjoy funny mysteries, characters breaking the fourth wall, and books about books, you’ll enjoy this book!

Eleanor Dash is on a book tour for her mystery book and finds herself involved in real life mysteries. This book has you captured from start to finish. The mysteries are clever and the banter is first class. I love how Eleanor‘s past relationships are somehow managing to affect her life in this weird odd way. This book keeps you from start to finish. It is so entertaining and for fans of movies such as knives out this is the perfect book for you.

The story is humorous, sassy, and has a good mystery. A fantastic arm chair travel read. I loved the author’s footnote commentary throughout the story, you literally felt like the character was speaking to you during the story. I also had a chance to see the uncorrected e-book proof of the book, and I can understand why some people found the format a little messy with all the footnotes. But as someone who reads a lot of informational books with footnotes, they don’t bother me. I would love to see how the footnotes look in the printed copy.

Every Time I Go On Vacation Someone Dies is a cozy mystery with no graphic on-page sex or violence, but it has a bit more edge to it. If you like very comforting cozies with no swearing, this book is not for you. But if you want a mystery that won’t keep you up at night, give you a thrill, make you laugh, and allow you to enjoy a good escape without minding some swearing, then give this book a try!

Definitely a fun and quirky read. I saw this on NetGalley and figured I’d give it a try cause it looked different and fun. I liked the story and all the pop culture references, and the mystery definitely kept me guessing. I could’ve done without the cussing but I have come to expect that in mainstream books and this one at least the cussing didn’t seem excessive. Liked this one.

The knives out comparison is on point. Really fun characters and an engaging mystery plot. Take this one to the beach or on a trip. Share with your friends. Enjoy!

This was truly just delicious fun. The KNIVES OUT comp is no word of a lie. I cannot wait for the next in the series!!!

I wasn’t able to finish this book and it makes me really sad. The story itself was fun and immediately gripping, but the formatting made it nearly impossible to read on my kindle. I will absolutely be purchasing a physical copy and read the entire book that way. Thank you for the opportunity to read this arc.

This book is as chaotic as the title suggests. In a good way, though, I think. The cast of characters seems ridiculous and the protagonist is not super likable, but it somehow all works. I had sort of guessed at the solution but didn’t have it quite all worked out. One note - the author keeps making funny asides about footnotes, but there are a million of them and they can be a little hard to manage on Kindle. I was glad I just upgraded mine so I have a bigger screen and it works faster.

Thank you to the publisher - I received a complimentary eARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

While this book is out of my genre comfort zone, I found myself fully engaged and delighted while reading it!

I’m not a big fan of murder mysteries, even the cozy ones, but it felt like the style of having the author breaking the third wall elevated the story-telling to a whole new level. I would almost call it a new genre! The author/narrator is witty and hilarious in addressing the reader and imploring them to solve the mystery itself.

The characters were well-enough developed to make me care and the story line was fun, but it really was the broken 4th wall that pulled me all the way through this book. I just loved it and would read more mysteries if they were written just like this!

Highly recommended to readers with playful spirits who maybe liked campy movies like The Glass Onion.

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review

Every Time I Go on Vacation, Someone Dies by Catherine Mack tells the story of author Eleanor Dash who goes on a book tour to in Italy and has decided to kill off her main character in her bestselling book. When the man who this character is based on starts starts claiming that someone wants to kill him, Eleanor decides to help figuring out this real life mystery.

Let me just say that I absolutely loved this book, it had comedy and murder, what else can a girl ask for. This book made me laugh several times and I loved the pop culture references it had, as a Swiftie, I loved when one of her songs was mentioned.

I loved the footnotes, I know the author said these were not mandatory to read but they were so much fun to read, so I highly recommend everyone to read them.

Another thing I loved about this book was when Eleanor broke the fourth wall and was asking us if we had figured out who was behind all the murders, I love murder mysteries and found it super fun to have the author break down the suspects and possible motives. Also, I can say I did figure out partially who had done it.

This book to me is 5 solid stars and the first one on the series. I cannot wait to see where this series takes us, I am for sure gonna read the next one that comes out.

Thank you NetGalley and St Martin's Press for providing me with this ARC, the above thoughts are my own.

This was a fun, light mystery with interesting characters and great locations. Not a new favorite, but a solid beach read.

Thank you so much for this ARC!

Any mystery set in Italy is an automatic request for me. I loved the premise and setting of this book, but some things really did not work for me.

First, reading the footnotes on an e-book were just difficult. I had so much trouble that I requested the audio book and also struggled to get through that. Lastly, I got the hard copy. It was much easier reading and I actually skipped through the footnotes throughout most of it unless I was really curious. It was fun idea but for me personally, I was not a fan.

I love books about authors so I did enjoy that portion. I didn't love Eleanor (she was needy and sometimes annoying) but I did enjoy the other aspects of the book - sibling issues, writers, Italy, stalking mystery, ex-issues.

This cozy mystery romance is quite clever. A young author based an adventure mystery novel on a real life vacation exploit and included the partner in her novel. Now ten years later, she is wants to rid her life of the man and plans to kill off his character in her book series. When it seems that someone is trying to kill him for real, things get tricky. Catherine Mack breaks the fourth wall with the fictional author talking to the reader near the end of many chapters. Each chapter has footnotes at the end with some of the character's asides. The concept was very funny. However it becomes a hustle in an eBook because they are at the end of the chapter and you have to scroll back to try and find the point they are referencing. Hopefully in the next book, the publishers will use a fixed page format with the footnotes on the bottom of the page. The writing is clever and the plot is good enough to keep all but the most avid mystery fan guessing until the end. Even though I had guessed the motive, I still had a few surprises. As the protagonist points out writers recycle plots all the time. There are no new plots , just new execution. But The plot twist that the author chose took me by surprise anyway. This book was provided by the publisher, but the opinions are entirely my own. I recommend it to cozy Mystery fans, and plan on reading the next book when it is published.

I appreciated that this was a fun, cozy summer mystery. I didn’t think it was a good fit for me because I felt that the excessive amount of footnotes took me out of the story and didn’t help the plot move along. I think it brought some funny moments, but the footnotes were just a bit too excessive and I really struggled to finish this one. I also didn’t feel that the cover reflected the story, it was a bit misleading.

An interesting book. I loved the cover, it was so enticing and inviting.
I did find the prose rather scattered and inconsistent. I was taken back by numerous footnotes. I've never read a fiction book with footnotes. I found them charming at first but then I found them excessive and interruptive.
Overall, it's an interesting story, but I do think there was way too much going on like the author was juggling way too many plot lines and characters to do equal justice to all of them.

Rating: 4.25⭐️

Summary: Eleanor Dash literally fell into becoming an author ten years ago after a whirlwind, crime-solving-filled trip to Italy. Now, she wants nothing more than to get through her book anniversary tour in Italy and kill off her main character, Connor Smith (in the books, not for real!!), who also happens to be her real-life ex-boyfriend. When it becomes apparent that someone truly is trying to kill Connor, Eleanor is forced into solving the case before bodies start dropping dead.

Sarah's Thoughts: A quirky, cheeky mystery that keeps you on your toes. This book honestly killed me. *wink* It felt like as the story went on every character gained a motive in the case while the opportunities to commit the crime grew. All the moving pieces and tidbits of clues were so fun to follow and try to pick them apart to find the truth. I loved the relationship between Eleanor and her sister, Harper, and how it evolves during the book making it feel so genuine. Do not sleep on this cozy, quirky mystery that takes you on a murderous tour of Italy. Can you figure out the culprit before the end?

Read if you love:
🕵️‍♀️Cozy Mysteries
😂Quirky Banter
✈️Traveling
📚Books about Books
❤️The Finlay Donovan Series

Thank you to Netgalley and Minotaur Books for the #gifted copy of the eArc!

Eleanor Dash has written 10 murder mysteries set in places she has vacationed. Now she decides to end the vacation Series, and kill off the main male character, a detective (and her ex-boyfriend)- Connor Smith. The final book is set in Italy where the first one was set 10 yrs ago. However, this time Eleanor, Connor, her sister/assistant, Harper, several other authors, another ex-boyfriend, and super fans are along on her publisher's promoted tour as they travel through Rome and along the Amalfi Coast. When Connor admits that someone is trying to kill him and Eleanor, she begins to incorporate the "accidents" into her narration and pose potential murderers.
Of course there was a murder and the group was held in their hotel as the police tried to determine the motive, method, and opportunity of the murderer.
We know from the beginning that Eleanor is an unreliable narrator and yet she offers the reader clues to solve the mystery. However, she also offers 237 footnotes which really ruined the story for me as they were mostly descriptive or anecdotal and added nothing to the story because they were so far from the citation. This book had a lot going for it - including a good twist, a plausible motive, and a reasonable ending.

A bestselling mystery author must solve a murder plot that is playing out on her Italian book tour before she’s the next victim.

When Eleanor Dash started writing a mystery series based on the investigations of private detective and conman, Connor Smith, she never knew they would be so successful. She also couldn’t foresee that Connor would turn out to be a total creep that would plague her existence for the next decade. Yet, here she is. While on an Italian book tour for her series, it becomes apparent that someone is trying to kill Connor and Eleanor finds herself on the case to uncover the culprit amidst a group of rabid fans, exes, and literary rivals.

Deeply clever, whimsical, and laugh out loud funny, this was not your average cozy mystery. Mack breaks the fourth wall, has hundreds of hysterical footnotes, and creates a profoundly relatable protagonist in Eleanor Dash. While the plot itself was a bit predictable and the wrongdoer wasn’t difficult to suss out, the work as a whole was a priceless bit of humor that plays on the common neuroses of both a writer and a woman in love. I couldn’t and didn’t want to put it down. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫 (4.5/5)

This is a super fun, tongue-in-cheek mystery novel that takes place in Rome, which I very much enjoyed, having just traveled to Rome last month. The book follows a mystery writer on a book trip to Rome and then people having "accidents" and she has to solve a real-life mystery when someone finally dies. The MC keeps breaking the fourth wall, so to speak, in a fun and snarky way. This is going to be first in a series and I'm looking forward to the story continuing.

I am having such a hard time writing this review! I loved this book? It drove me crazy? It was so funny? But it drove me crazy? I couldn't stop reading it? But it drove me crazy? The writing style of this book contained the use of approximately 1 million (or so it felt) footnotes. Now, the author mentioned early on that you didn't NEED to read the footnotes. But was she kidding? Was it a plot device? Either way, they popped up so frequently it was hard not to read them, and almost all of them were incredibly witty, so I WANTED to read them...but MAN were they distracting! It was so hard to keep with the flow of the story with a footnote popping up every page. That being said...the writing was great, it kept me guessing in the best possible ways, it just needed a few hundred less footnotes :) *This review was collected as part of a netgalley promotion