Cozy-ish Mystery about an American doctor and coroner working in Scotland as she investigates a famous band's lead singer's murder and the theft of his new music.

5/5 stars: This is the third entry in Connelly's Scottish Isle Mystery series, which is Cozy-ish Mystery that takes place at Christmas in Scotland and follows an American former ER doctor turned village doctor and coroner as she looks into the murder of a famous band's lead singer and who stole his new music. When the village's beloved Constable becomes the prime suspect, she'll race to figure out who is framing him. Between a secret Santa that wants her dead, stalkers and killer holiday celebrations, she'll have to discover the truth before it’s too late. With plenty of twists and turns, Connelly has masterfully crafted a mystery that deftly balances the suspects, clues and red herrings and will leave you pondering the whodunit until the final reveal. Additionally, Connelly's writing and character work are stellar; the characters are well-rounded and complex while remaining incredibly likable. It's a joy to catch back up with Em, the found family she's built in Sea Isle and it's various village folk. I especially like how thoughtfully Connelly's written Em's assistant Abigail's brother Tommy, who's neurodivergent. And I have to say I really enjoy the slow build-up of Em and Ewan's “can't get along with each other but really like each other” relationship. Some might find the medical and crime scene a bit intense, so be sure to check the CWs. While you could read this as a stand-alone, you'll gain so much more by reading the series from the beginning; so be sure to check out book one, An American in Scotland.

I received this eARC thanks to NetGalley and Crooked Lane Books in exchange for an honest review. Publishing dates are subject to change.

I enjoyed this book. It was the perfect setting, Scotland at Christmas! It had mystery and kept you reading to find out who did it.

The characters were well thought out and I really liked the dynamics of the band.

But nothing really wowed me. It was a nice read though.

A good cozy mystery read for Christmas.

We are back on Sea Isle in Scotland with Dr. Emilia McRoy. It's December and Em is on holiday. The isle celebrates every holiday and Mara signs Em up to help so she doesn't feel left out. A Scottish band has come into town to play at the pub. When the lead singers body is found. Em must find out why he died.

I love this series and love following the mystery with the doctor/coroner. I enjoy the writing and love the quirky townsfolk. I can't wait to read more of this series.

‘The people here took their holidays seriously.’

Okay, so this is the third book in this series, and I have not yet read the first two. I will, though, because I am keen to learn more about the people of Sea Isle, Scotland.

In this book, which can be read as a standalone mystery, Dr Emilia (Em) McRoy is getting ready for Christmas. She is even taking a holiday! Em’s friend, Mara, manages the Pig& Whistle pub and calls Em for help. A band has been hired to play at the Pig & Whistle, but their bus has broken down: can Em help her to pick them up? Certainly, she can.

The festive mood is destroyed, though, when Bram (the lead singer of the band) is murdered, and Em’s holiday ends abruptly. Who killed Bram, and why? The group was about to embark on a world tour, and Em discovers that the music Bram was working on has disappeared.
Investigations reveal that several people were not happy with Bram, and motives for murder are easy to find. But when Constable Ewan Campbell becomes a suspect and Em acquires a stalker, things become complicated. And then another member of the band is murdered.

A marvellous cast of characters as well as a few twists while the story unfolds: I thoroughly enjoyed this novel. There’s a suitable ending, and (I hope) more novels to come. In the meantime, I’ll track down a copy of the first two.

Note: My thanks to NetGalley and Crooked Lane Books for providing me with a free electronic copy of this book for review purposes.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

When a world famous rock band performs a special Christmas concert, the town of Sea Isle floods with tourists. The concert helps usher in a season of Christmas events, traditional to the small community. Dr. Emilia McCoy is looking forward to a peaceful vacation before her job begins as Doctor and Coroner for the residents. Her visions of decorating and baking, disappear when the lead singer is found murdered! Adding detective to her job title, she begins to sift through the evidence to unmask the killer.

The town's Christmas Festivals, celebrating holiday customs from around the world, make you want to visit, as do, the village's warm and welcoming people. Christmas snow is plentiful making Sea Isle the perfect place to spend the holiday. A romantic element is deftly woven into the plot. A fun cozy mystery if you ignore some tiny holes in the plot. My own personal peeve: writers and editors who do not know the correct usage of "I" and "me."

Dr. Emilia McRoy Is spending her first Christmas in Sea Isle, Scotland. The town had given her the full month off to celebrate, and she didn't know what she'd be doing with all her free time. She soon found out. Sea Isle celebrated many variations of the holidays on different evenings so as to be inclusive of all of their citizens.

The local pub started the month with a performance by a well known Scottish band.
Two members of the band grew up in the area so they were happy to do it.

The following morning the doc was walking to the pub for breakfast when she found the lead singer's dead body on the beach. Was it murder or a suicide? It was now up to Constable Ewan Campbell and Dr. Emilia McRoy to make sense of the latest death in their community.

This author is wonderful. So many suspects and clues make it interesting to the end.

#DeathataScottishChristmas

This is my first time reading a Lucy Connelly mystery. It works well as a stand-alone. American Dr. Em McRoy is settling in and becoming part of the Scottish community on Sea Isle. Her best friend Mara invites another friend and her band to perform during the holiday season. Bram and the Stokers are featured early in the diverse celebrations that Ewan Campbell presides over. The local Laird, mayor and constable who hired Em is quite busy with everything. Surprisingly the doctor is told she has a month vacation and that she will be able to take part in the community celebrations.
The murder of the band's lead singer changes that.
I received an advanced reader's copy from Crooked Lane Books through NetGalley and this is my unsolicited opinion about it. An interesting mystery, I liked the chance to learn a bit about some of the things that could take place for celebrations in Scotland at Christmas. Of course, the main content is the mystery surrounding the odd death of the singer who Em as coroner finds to be a popular entertainer. My favorite characters were Em and her assistant Abigail along with the younger woman's brother. To add to the suspense Ewan is a suspect in the investigation that swings back and forth with other possible suspects.
I liked the story. There's no serious violence or graphic descriptions of crime in my opinion. There is UK slang. I give it a 4 out of 5 stars.

Dr. Emilia McRoy, Doctor, and Coroner residing in Sea Isle, Scotland is settling into her daily routine and and making friends among the locals.

Emilia's invited to attend a friend's wedding at Morrigan Castle owned by Lord and Constable Ewan Campbell. It's a three-day party with a snow storm on the way trapping everyone inside. As friends and family mingle, Emilio explores the castle and finds a dead man in one of the turrets along with two of her friends being poisoned.

It's up to Emilio and Ewan to find the killer and protect those in the castle since no local police can travel because of the snow storm. There's a killer among them and everyone denies knowing the dead man. Those attending the wedding aren't what they seem and someone is determine to stop the wedding by any means including murder.




https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/6158298769

I loved the synopsis but found it very difficult to get engaged in the story or relate to the characters. I do not recommend this book.

“ Death at a Scottish Christmas ” by Lucy Connelly the 3rd instalment in the " A Scottish Isle Mystery" series. I love this series.

I really enjoyed visiting Sea Isle, Scotland again especially at Christmas, and seeing how Em has found her footing in the community on the island. Another thing I enjoy is the relationship between Em, Mara, Abigail, Angie and of course Ewen. I’m still hoping something romantic develops between Ewen and Em maybe in book four…

It was entertaining, full of twists and turns and I didn’t completely guess whodunnit until Em did.

I highly recommend this series to all my cozy loving friends and I can’t wait for book 4 to come out!

I requested and received an advanced readers copy from Crooked Lane and NetGalley. All thoughts and opinions are my OWN.

It is December in Sea Isle, Scotland, and Dr. Emilia McRoy is getting her first taste of the holidays in her new home. However, the death of a musical icon who performed with his group at the pub leads Emilia into another murder investigation.

Bram was a charismatic character who just happened to have an affair with Constable Ewan Campbell's fiancée many years ago. Ewan isn't happy to have him back in his hometown, but he didn't murder him despite the opinion of an imported cop.

As Emilia tries to look into the cause of death and Bram's medical records, she also has to deal with one of the other members of the band who is hysterical and who drugs herself into a coma. Then there is the band's manager who is looking for a way to capitalize on Bram's death to make money until he dies suspiciously himself.

Then Ewan is attacked and requires emergency surgery to prevent a brain bleed which is up to Emilia since a blizzard has rolled in preventing moving him to another hospital.

I enjoyed this mystery. It is the third in a series and I have been enjoying how Emilia is fitting in at her new community and making some close friends.

What a perfect kind of Christmas story- murder. The combination of mystery, murder, and the spirit of the holidays. The friendships, the country, and the characters bring to you to a place where one would want to go during the Christmas season. The bonus would be to help in discovering the murder.

I really like this series. The setting, the town, the characters are great. I feel as though I’m there also. I can’t help but feel sad though about the killer. #DeathataScottishChristmas #NetGalley

Lucy Connelly has written another wonderful book in the Scottish Isle Mystery series! There are so many things I love about this series, starting with smart, tough and serious protagonist Emilia, who seems to be finding more joy in life in each book. It’s great to have a character who is smart and works with the police (for the most part) and what great constable she has to work with! I also love the community in this series. It is exactly the kind of place I enjoy escaping to when I read a book. It’s small and cozy, people really care about each other, there are interesting characters and a wonderful Scottish setting. I did not figure out the mystery until the characters did and was very surprised. I love it when an author can truly keep me guessing until the end! Lucy Connelly has quickly become an author that any new books she writes go immediately on the top of my To-Be-Read list!

Thank you to NetGalley for allowing me to review this book. All opinions are my own.

I really enjoyed this third book in the Scottish Isle Mystery. The characters are engaging and the mystery kept you doing some guessing. I have really been enjoying this series and hope that it will continue for at least a few more stories.

#DeathataScottishChristmas #NetGalley

This was a cute cozy mystery that is part of a series but I did not have any problem reading this one even though I had not read the others. A American MD who now lives in Scotland as their local MD and also the coroner is on Christmas vacation when a very popular rock star dies . This one kept me guessing until the end . I look forward to reading more by this author.

This is a fast-paced and enjoyable mystery, which keeps you interested. Dr Emilia works in an idyllic Scottish village where she is also the coroner. When a band comes to town and the lead singer is murdered, she has to investigate. There are many twists and turns along the way and Em has to find out whether the killer was a band member or a crazy fan. I thought that the mystery was a bit amateur and I found some of the relationships in the book a bit confusing because I haven’t read the first two books.

However, I really liked the Christmassy setting and the descriptions of the events and festivals in the village. This book certainly makes you want to live in Scotland!

I received this free ebook from NetGalley in return for an honest review.

This book was gripping and hard to put down. It didn't feel like everything else you see out there, it felt very fresh. I really enjoyed this book!

From a big city ER doctor to the doctor/coroner of the small community of Sea Isle Scotland, Dr Emilia McRoy is enjoying the change of pace and the feeling of belonging in this close-knit community. Taking a month’s vacation before she starts work, the last thing she expects is to find Bram, the leader of a worldwide famous band dead on the local beach. Having given a community performance the night before, the last thing anybody expected was to find him dead!
Suspects abound but since most are either band mates, friends or locals, along with a few groupies, narrowing the field becomes a battle of wits, not to mention someone trying by harm Emilia while she tries to solve the mysterious death. Has she come too close to the killer without even knowing it? With the help of her friends and the hunky if somewhat grumpy Constable Ewan Campbell Emilia helps find the answer while still enjoying the many traditions of the community during the Christmas season.
I enjoyed this mystery from the setting to the characters and look forward to more books from this author.

This is the first book in this series I have read & I appreciated that some background information was filled in without bogging down the book with it. It felt like just the right amount for me. I liked this book overall, but it did feel a bit twee to me at times. My two biggest frustrations with the book are the confusing timeline (repeated uses of "that night" in conversation when the event being discussed seemingly just happened the night before aka last night) & the lack of follow-up on some of the supposed clues we are given. For instance, there is a character who mentions feeling foggy and weird since arriving in town, the doctor thinks, hmm, better run some blood tests, and then WE NEVER HEAR ABOUT IT AGAIN! I also felt like we lacked sufficient understanding of how & why the crime was committed at the end. I personally want to understand the how & why, even in a cozy mystery. I wasn't quite satisfied with who the murderer ended up being.

So what did I enjoy? I enjoyed the setting & the town events that took place. It felt Christmas-y without being over the top. I mostly liked what I think are the main & recurring characters, though I agree with another review I saw that the closeness of the friendships seems a bit over the top for the amount of time they have known each other. While this series probably won't be my first choice for a cozy to read, I could see myself reading another.

Thanks to NetGalley & Crooked Lane Books for the ARC in exchange for an honest review!