Our four female assassins are back! This time, they’ve been hired for a covert mission to uncover a mole within their organization and take down a gangster targeting Museum agents.

Everything I loved about Killers of a Certain Age—the witty dialogue, the larger-than-life “mature” female characters, and the engaging writing—can also be found in Kills Well With Others. However, this time, the characters' mission and relationships are even more deeply developed.

I combined the audio version with the physical book and really loved the narration, so I listened to most of the book. The audio is easy to follow, featuring hilarious comedic timing and excellent voices with amazing accents. Highly, highly recommend this format!

Raybourn makes Kills Well with Others accessible to new readers by providing a helpful recap of Killers of a Certain Age, allowing it to be enjoyed as a standalone. The story wraps up neatly without any cliffhangers, so I’m curious if another book is in the works. I’m definitely hoping for more—if there is, count me in! I absolutely love everything about this series! ❤️

Other highlights: side characters, crucial flashbacks, art history

This was a good follow up to the first book in this series, but a lot of the issues I had with the first book, continued into this book. First of all, we didn't need all of the reminders that the women were "so old" because they aren't. It felt weirdly ageist at some points. The way this was written, kept making me think the women were in their 90s, not their 60s. I was also a little bored by the pacing in this one and felt like there needed to be more action and intrigue throughout the story. There were also some weird European references that seemed to miss the mark. They were super strange to read and didn't make a ton of sense.

It was still overall a good book, but I was expecting more.

4.5 stars. A great follow-up to Killers of a Certain Age, the first in this series. Once again, the reader is able to follow the adventures of Billie, Helen, Natalie and Mary Alice, four “retired” professional assassins. And, as much as I enjoyed their adventures in the first book, I may have enjoyed this one even more! Perhaps it is because I had some back story about the characters, which was added to and developed in this novel so that I felt as though I were reading about the newest adventures of some of my friends (if assassins were among my friends!). Replete with great pacing, heart-stopping action, humor, history, and plenty of twists and turns, this was a really enjoyable read. I look forward to the third in this series.

I’ve had this for a while and started it a number of times but just couldn’t get engaged in the story when all of a sudden t it was just what I needed. Murder, mayhem, betrayal-well true it’s like the real world but there was just something delightful with a group of older women setting the world straight. Not sure we need a third title in the series but this was an enjoyable read.

This was SO. MUCH. FUN. I had no idea there was going to be a sequel when I picked up Killers of a Certain Age and it was just an absolute delight to be back with these characters again. Will there be more? Please say there will be more!

I don’t consider myself the biggest fan of cozy mystery, but I enjoyed KILLERS OF A CERTAIN AGE enough to continue on with this (unexpected) sequel. It was just okay. For sure slower than your typical mystery, and it had its funny moments, but overall I think I’ll forget that I read this a month from now.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

A true romp, Billie and friends are so fun to follow as they team up for "one last job" (or is it? I hope not!). As I get older, I love reading about more mature characters who are still living full lives and boy are these assassins doing just that! The relationships between Billie, Natalie, Mary Alice and Helen felt like they had real history and I love Billie and Taverner together (and apart, honestly). I've seen a few people calling these books a cross between the Golden Girls and Kill Bill, or Charlie's (retired/senior citizen) Angels and that's exactly the vibe.

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for the eARC.

It was wonderful to be back with these characters once again! I enjoy the relationship they have with one another and their kick-butt attitudes. The author did a great job keeping my interest with the different timelines, the action sequences, and the mystery of it all. I also enjoy the descriptions of the different places the characters get to visit; it makes me feel like I'm actually there with them. I recommend to those who enjoy the idea of aging women who haven't lost their stuff yet.

I was so excited to see that Killers of a Certain Age wasn’t going to end and that readers were going to get a chance to tag along with Billie, Helen, Mary Alice, and Natalie once again!

Who would have thought a series about four senior-aged assassins would bring me so much joy? Raybourn has truly created a killer world I want to be part of, from the glimpses into the group's early cases to their present day interactions. The way these ladies interact together is both heartwarming and down right hilarious at times.

I loved the layers of the case that Raybourn has sent our assassins to investigate this time around. The secondary characters truly add to the depth of the story along with snippets of previous cases.

This is the second book in the series and while I think you could get away with not reading the first beforehand, I do recommend starting in order.

This is just such a fun world and I loved learning more about our lead. This has Deanna Raybourn classic lines and her writing is so distinct in her characters and personalities - and this style works really well for me! I had a lot of fun with this story and can't wait for whatever she writes next!

Deanna Raybourn is one of my preferred comfort authors, even when she's writing about murder and mayhem. (If you haven't read her Veronica Speedwell series, it's one of my favorites!)

In Kills Well With Others she continues the Killers of a Certain Age series with four women assassins who still have what it takes after decades in action. Billie, Helen, Mary Alice, and Natalie receive a summons from the mysterious organization known as The Museum, a shadowy entity directing their elite team of assassins to take out some of the world's worst figures. They are directed to pursue an Eastern European gangster, but the case quickly becomes more complicated than they expected, and they end up on a wild adventure across the globe.

Ms Raybourn writes such fun thriller mysteries: brilliant courageous women, so much witty banter, fantastic descriptions that make the settings come alive. I loved that she had these women who might have been nearing retirement age in another life still completely competent and accomplishing their missions. The idea to use a fake menopause app for hiding their communication from anyone who might get ahold of their phones was genius! Also, I learned the phrase 'Stern Brunch Daddy' which I will now add to my vocabulary. :)

Note: if you read this, there a chapter around the painting 'The Shepherdess of the Sphinxes.' Go look it up and see the glorious lioness women surrounded by the remains of the men they devoured, with their majestic shepherdess standing over them!

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

Kills Well with Others, by Deanna Raybourn, brings back our favorite female assassins Billie, Mary Alice, Helen, and Natalie. A year after the crazy happenings in Killers of a Certain Age, these sixty-ish year old are each living a quiet life under the radar, enjoying some well-deserved rest. But they're all very excited when they're called back into action by Naomi Ndiaye, head of their elite assassin organization known as the Museum. Some important and confidential files have been leaked and an operative has been murdered, so the fab four are tasked with eliminating the threat while also dealing with a possible mole within organization.

As we follow along on their escapades, the ladies are taken all across Europe and meet up with a host of fabulous characters - some returning and some new faces. The story is narrated by Billie in both past and present timelines and we're given a look into some of the groups missions in the past and a peak into who the mole might be.

The whole thing was fun and exciting! I loved the fact that these ladies would all kill for each other, bu they still sqabble like siblings. The banter was awesome, the action was unstoppable, the disquises were perfect, and I enjoyed the whole ride. I couldn't tell if the ending showed a chance of a third installment of these fearless assassins, but if so, I'll be first in line for the ride.

Thank you to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest thoughts.

I'm not the biggest mystery fan but I loved Killers of a Certain Age so much that when I saw this on NetGalley, I smashed that request button so fast. If it has assassins, I'm going to read it regardless of genre. And characters in their 60s? Yup.

It was so fun to be back with Billie, Helen, Mary Alice and Natalie and all the people they've collected. For secret assassins, they sure do collect people.

I think this could be read as a standalone. It was a completely separate storyline than the first book and there's plenty of background info. If you're looking for a fun mystery, please check this book out. Can't wait to see if Deanna Raybourn revisits the characters in the future.

Thank you to @berkleypub for the early copy of Killers of A Certain Age. It's out now!

For some reason, America (and perhaps the world) has a fascination with retirees that are involved in detective work and/or murder-for-hire. Whether it's Richard Osman's The Thursday Murder Club, Tess Gerritsen's The Spy Coast, the TV show Only Murders in the Building, or Deanna Raybourn's Killers of a Certain Age, they've all been successful and popular over the last few years. Raybourn's follow-up to her enjoyable 2023 novel picks up a few years after the events of that book, and our four main characters are back for another adventure.

To recap, the series focuses on four women—Billie (the main narrator), Mary Alice, Helen, and Natalie—who were all recruited to join an international group of assassins known as "The Museum" while they were in college in the late 1970s. The Museum was originally founded to track down and kill Nazis who had evaded capture, with a secondary focus on reclaiming looted art and returning it to its rightful owners., With the world running out of Nazis, "the Museum turned its efforts to drug smugglers, arms dealers, human traffickers—folks who needed killing, in other words."

Our ladies, however, are retired, and fully intend to stay that way. But when there's a security breach at the Museum, and their identities are leaked to the child of a man they'd murdered decades prior, the women must once again mobilize and put to use their decades of plotting, tracking, and murdering experience in a game of "kill or be killed." Once again, we're treated to action-filled sequences paired with witty banter (and even a Schwarzenegger-esque pun after a killing) while layering in just enough seriousness to keep things from tipping too out of balance.

I enjoyed Killers of a Certain Age, to the point that it finished just outside my Top 20 in 2023. I'd forgotten about Raybourn's saucy sense of humor with her ladies; there's a good amount of humorous back-and-forth throughout that offsets any significant tension. Its fun, and the jocular tone it strikes, even during potentially perilous sequences, is reminiscent of James Bond movies in the 1980s before things got a lot more gritty and serious with Daniel Craig. This is a kick-back-and-enjoy-it type of book. It's well-structured and plotted (although at times a bit too conveniently), but it's one where you have a good idea that the good guys (or girls) are going to prevail in the end.

Raybourn does a nice job of succinctly recapping the first book and reminding the reader of the key pieces of information and events of that story, to the point that you could conceivably read this as a stand-alone novel. But why would you? If you haven't read either, start at the start with Killers of a Certain Age. And if you enjoyed the original Killers, I suspect you'll like this one at least as much, if not more. It fell a bit short of a 5-star book for me, mostly because of the lack of true tension, but it's a solid 4.5 that held my interest and attention throughout.

A few days ago, Deanna Raybourn did a bookstore event at the Poisoned Pen in Arizona that was streamed on YouTube, and an audience member asked her if she’d received any pushback to writing about older women. Surprisingly, she revealed that she had written Killers of a Certain Age at the behest of her publisher:

“It was their idea. They were having a meeting at my publisher’s office in New York, and someone raised the question, ‘Why do we not have more books about older women doing kick-ass things?’ Somebody else said, ‘We need to,’ and somebody else said ‘Well, who would write it?’ and apparently, they all said my name at the same time, which I took as a tremendous compliment. That was literally the brief: would you be interested in writing a book about older women doing something cool? And I said yes, absolutely.”

As someone who is constantly on the lookout for books about vibrant older women (I even maintain a list of them here), at first I felt a little sad that publishers are receiving so few manuscripts with strong female characters in their 50s and beyond that they had to basically commission one. But since their discussion led to Raybourn writing about four female assassins in their 60s, everything worked out very well indeed, based on Killers of a Certain Age and its brand-new sequel, Kills Well With Others.

Kills Well begins two years after the events in the first book; our lethal quartet survived all of the attempts on their lives in Killers, but the thing about being an assassin is that not everyone is going to be happy with the results of your labors. Somebody is determined to avenge a killing that happened decades ago, and the women need to come out of retirement once again, banding together in order to protect themselves and their loved ones.

The assignment takes Billie, Helen, Mary Alice, and Natalie to one picturesque location after another; Raybourn revealed that she spent a week in Venice doing research, and the scenes set in the Floating City are especially well-rendered.

The book is full of action, thrills and a welcome bit of humor—at one point, the foursome acquire a chicken named Nula, which Natalie believes will help make her undercover identity as a peasant grandmother more convincing. Keeping a chicken alive while trying to kill a target isn’t easy.

During her bookstore talk, Raybourn stated that she’d kept a photo of Diane Lane taped to her computer as inspiration when she wrote Killers of a Certain Age. It would be amazing to see Lane, who recently turned 60, portray one of Raybourn’s assassins. If only Hollywood was as open to stories about older women kicking ass as the publisher of this novel.

Our favorite semi-retired over-60 women assassins are back in action. This time around, they're cleaning up some loose ends from one of their earliest missions in the 70s when it's clear that someone is out for revenge.

I rarely pick up something that could be defined as a mystery thriller in a contemporary setting, and yet a few years ago I picked up Killers of a Certain Age because I really liked Deanna Raybourn's Victorian mysteries, Veronica Speedwell. I had an absolute blast and knew I needed to read more from the series (thankfully so did everyone else, and Raybourn's publisher let her write another!). Her style and tone translates really well to this setting, with amusing pop culture references (does it bring *you* joy to kill off your enemies? Our ladies think the Marie Kondo approach can work) and relatable characters who have their friends' backs through thick and thin.

This series is such fun to read, and is such a delightful change of pace for me. It moves quickly and keeps the reader engaged throughout. You can easily read this book without having read the first one, as the plots are not intertwined and it's easy to pick up the details of how Billie's organization works. (That said, I do highly recommend Killers of a Certain Age as well!)

Billie, Mary Alice, Helen, and Natalie are back! It's a year after their last adventure and "the museum" sends for the retired assassins for an off-the-books assignment. There's a mole at the agency feeding information to someone with a grudge against the four friends. Someone from the agency has already been killed, and it has to do with a job from the past and a need for vengeance. Another non-stop action adventure starring four of our favorite sexigenarions and an ever-growing cadre of accomplices!

After a two year hiatus since their last mission Billie, Helen, Natalie, and Mary Alice are once again called into action after a the head of The Museum discovers there a mole in their ranks. When one of their agents is killed who assembled information on an Eastern European gangster who just so happens to have been taken out by our intrepid foursome, the women must work off the grid to find out who it is before they're next on the list.

I thought that the story ended well in the first book and basically thought it was a one-off. I wasn't expecting a sequel, so when I learned we were getting another one, I was delighted.

It's great to have the ladies back in action and with the way they pick right back up where they left off, you would never know they haven't interacted with one another in two years. It's a testament to their bond for sure.

Again, the story is interspersed with the past and the present. I really enjoyed the past scenes because I love the glimpse we get of the women in their heyday. Plus, they are done so well in how they connected to and / or informed the present case. It added more depth to the characters to see how they were still the same, how they had changed, or what they still struggled with.

Billie is again the main narrator of the present day scenes. The fact that in the past chapters we kind of get everyone's perspective might also be why I enjoy those sections more because I like getting a more in depth look at everyone.

I love that Deanna Raybourn gave us these bada** senior women. While, I will say, this book ends similarly to the first book in that it's satisfying and we get a definite conclusion, I would fully support this series continuing on.

Thank you NetGalley, Berkley and author, Deanna Raybourn for the arc!

Our favorite foursome of senior assassins are back with more murder & mayhem in this sequel to Killers Of A Certain Age!

These women are a warped & twisted but oh so funny romp! Think Charlie’s Angels but ahem, all grown up!!! AND they are an elite squad of assassins that are not to be messed with!

Just like the first book in the series, there is plenty of action & snark & witty banter as these killer besties hunt down the bad guys! Their interaction with each other made me laugh all the way through & I love the lengths they go to, to get the job done! (hello chicken on the train, I’m looking at you!)

It’s a globe trotting, action packed, comedic thrill ride that is just a plain ole good time with characters that will win your heart!

Thank you to Berkley and PRH Audio for the copies to review.

Ok I really enjoyed the first book but my goodness I think I loved this second one even more! Maybe because I recently read the first one or maybe because we jumped right in, but these senior female assassins hooked me right back in with their banter and I must admit, their killings, and I really enjoyed this plot all the way through. The audio was great, narrators Jane Oppenheimer and Christina Delaine did a fabulous job throughout. It felt like there was closure with this second book but I would not be mad if these ladies continued on again, I enjoyed my time with them so much.