The Library Game was a fun little mystery. I think I would have enjoyed it more if I had read the first three books in the series.

Update: I had read the ARC of this book back in December and enjoyed it for is low stakes cozy feel so when the audiobook was offered as an ALC I grabbed it to do a re read.

I enjoyed it the same the second time around! The narrator Soneela Nankani did an OK job with the material. I will say at 1x the rate it was way too slow to listen to for my tastes. It was also a little uneven with parts being drawn out and breathy and then she would speed up out of the blue. However, speeding up the rate a bit solved the issue for the most part. The other thing that may not be as enjoyable is the vocal changes for different characters were very subtle so it was hard to keep characters straight. But overall it didn’t impact my enjoyment of the story.

So if you’re an audio reader, give the audiobook a shot, just speed it up a touch! I want to thank Macmillan audio for the ALC!

Original Review:

This is my first time reading this author and despite this being the 4th book in the series, I figured it could be read as a stand alone as most cozy mysteries can. And I was right. I had no issue having not read the first books as any information needed was explained in this book in a seamless way.

This is the epitome of “cozy” mystery. It’s one that you can just curl up with and get through quickly. It is a little slow at the beginning but it quickly picks up to get into the action.

It’s the type of book that you wish you could be in real like. An old house being transformed into a niche library with a murder mystery dinner? Yes please!

So if you’re looking for a fun low stakes cozy read for this early Spring, this book comes out on March 18th 2025.

I am thankful to have gotten an eARC for free from St Martin’s Press through NetGalley to enjoy which gave me the opportunity to voluntarily leave a review.

Can I just say that St Martins line up from different imprints for the first half of the year is killing it!! So many awesome books coming out!
My rating system since GoodReads doesn’t have partial stars and I rarely round up.

⭐️ Hated it
⭐️⭐️ Had a lot of trouble, prose issues, really not my cup of tea (potentially DNF’d or thought about it)
⭐️⭐️⭐️ Meh, it was an ok read but nothing special
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Really enjoyed it! Would recommend to others
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Outstanding! Will circle back and read again