While I like the first two books in the series it seems like the rest of the books haven't lived up to the first two at least to me. However I feel like die hard cozy fan's will love this book and series.

Lynn Cahoon's Tourist Trap series is my favorite cozy series ever. This is another lovely installment with Jill, Greg and the gang to try to solve the death of Ted Hendricks, whom Jill found dead in his car. Fun mystery, great characters and a lovely setting. If you like cozies, check this series out!

I love being back in South Cove! The town is lovely with cute shops and full of characters. Most are likable and the few that aren't definitely make it interesting! I like hearing about all the town council stuff and the shop owners' revenue worries. It's not overdone - just enough to add a little bit of realism and interest. I always dislike when characters in a cozy never actually work the job they're supposed to be doing. Cahoon does a good job with balancing this so that I feel that Jill actually works but it isn't overload on details. I enjoyed this 3rd entry into the series more than the last book which had felt a little rushed and disjointed. While this is a fast paced mystery the pacing was great. The mystery was as usual well done and I was relieved that Jill wasn't a suspect this time. I like Jill and Greg's relationship. They have their problems with Greg's job and Jill's nosiness but they don't get their feelings hurt too often or hold grudges for too long. I really liked that Jill made a conscious effort to not get involved and respect Greg's wishes. It didn't exactly work out but she tried!

Con: This is difficult as I really enjoyed this mystery! The ending did feel a little rushed and while I found all the subplots interesting I probably would've been okay with 1 or 2 less.

Overall: This is a fun cozy mystery series that just seems to be getting stronger. I'm really looking forward to my 4th visit to South Cove and seeing what Jill's up to next.

If the Shoe Kills
A Tourist Trap Mystery #3
Lynn Cahoon
Kensington Books, November 2014
ISBN 978-1-60183-306-8
Trade Paperback

From the publisher—

The tourist town of South Cove, California, is a lovely place to spend the holidays. But this year, shop owner Jill Gardner discovers there’s no place like home for homicide. . .

As owner of Coffee, Books, and More, Jill Gardner looks forward to the hustle and bustle of holiday shoppers. But when the mayor ropes her into being liasion for a new work program, ’tis the season to be wary. Local businesses are afraid the interns will be delinquents, punks, or worse. For Jill, nothing’s worse than Ted Hendricks–the jerk who runs the program. After a few run-ins, Jill’s ready to kill the guy. That, however, turns out to be unnecessary when she finds Ted in his car–dead as a doornail. Officer Greg assumes it’s a suicide. Jill thinks it’s murder. And if the holidays weren’t stressful enough, a spoiled blonde wants to sue the city for breaking her heel. Jill has to act fast to solve this mess–before the other shoe drops. . .

I’m ashamed to admit that I read this l-o-n-g ago and never got around to writing a review, not because I hated it or had a beef with the author but because, well, I just sort of kept pushing it down the to-review list until it kind of became an embarrassment. I decided to woman up and get it done, finally, and I discovered an interesting thing—I remember it, remember it quite well. Now, that may be SOP for many of you but, except for a handful of standouts that are implanted in my brain, I usually need some sort of prompt to remind me, whether it be the description on the book jacket or a mention of something in someone else’s review. None of that was needed this time.

What, exactly, does that mean? Well, it means I think this is a really enjoyable cozy, one with memorable characters—book and coffee shop owner Jill and her “boy toy”, Detective Greg King, the Martha Stewart-ish Aunt Jackie and the overbearing Mayor Baylor along with many others—and a town I wouldn’t mind living in. The charitable project that riles everyone up is a worthy one that could work in real life and the potential motivations for the inevitable murder actually make sense. Jill herself has some validity in sleuthing and, thank heavens, she doesn’t fall into the TSTL trap.

As for the mystery itself, I have to say this is pretty darned good, causing me to go in one direction and another until I figured it out but that wasn’t until near the end so, all in all, this is a cozy mystery I can happily recommend to anyone looking for a well-done puzzle. Since it took me so long to get around to reviewing this, there are more books out in the series; as it happens, I have #1 in the series so I think I’ll start from the beginning😉

Reviewed by Lelia Taylor, January 2017.