Murder Comes to Call

Love this series and loved this latest installment. This series is just plain fun. It’s very well written and highly entertaining. I love the characters and their easy banter with each other. The plot and storyline is both interesting and well developed that the reader just wants to keep reading to find out what happens next. I highly recommend this novel. I can’t praise it enough!

Walmsley Parva SEEMS like a nice village but Beryl and Edwina know otherwise! They're hired to find out who has been committing burglaries in the village but much to their dismay, they also find Gordon Faraday, the cranky magistrate, dead. Of course, they do! These two, who are so different in approach met at school and have bonded over the series= but this is fine as a standalone. Beryl, an American, tends to go more on intuition (but not really) while Edwina is more logical0 making them excellent partners in an investigation that includes the theft of census documents (why would someone steal them?). This is a lovely cozy and readers of the genre know that there was more than one person who wished Faraday ill, that the pair will joust with the constable, and that there will be a resolution. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. A fun read.

This is a delightful, thoughtful, fun series featuring two odd friends of a certain age - Beryl and Edwina - who find themselves living together to make ends meet in a small English village, post WWI. Edwina is the prim and proper spinster who dutifully stayed at home after her schooling and took care of her parents. She is left with a good reputation, a crumbling house, and no money. Her school friend Beryl is the exact opposite - a free spirit who has roamed the world and had all kinds of adventures and men. Both are broke and stumble upon a few mysteries that they are able to solve together. This story is the third in the series. The women are finding their strengths, making a bit of money, and uncovering another mystery. Readers who enjoy a cozy mystery with wit, well drawn characters, and a charming, homely setting, as well as a puzzling mystery, will adore this series! Every new story is a real treat! More Beryl and Edwina, please!

Wow! This book is so good! It is entertaining, adventurous, fun, witty, and cozy-mysterious! Whenever I picked up "Murder Comes to Call", I found myself engrossed in quite a few intriguing mysteries, and did not want to put the book down!

This is the fourth book in Ms. Ellicott's "A Beryl and Edwina Mystery" series, but the first I have read. While I believe reading the others in the series would help to deepen one's understanding of the characters' history and relationships to one another, I definitely think this book can be read as a stand-alone as well. The author does a great job of filling the reader in (without it ever feeling like too much at once), and I now can't wait to go back and read the first three books. She mixes history with historical fiction quite well throughout the book. Ms. Ellicott's story-telling is just spectacular, and she also really brings her characters to life brilliantly. Their personalities are so distinct, and from Edwina, to Beryl, to Crumpet (oh the puppy is just so precious!), etc., so many of them are just delightful!

I adore how much Beryl and Edwina bring out the best in each other. It is so fun to watch them solve these cases, and they always have one another's back. Their dialogue is so witty, and they really balance one another out beautifully. They take their jobs seriously, truly want to help those in need, and do what is right!

I don't want to say too much about the mysteries in the book, as it would spoil too much of the plot! From the various burglaries, to the censuses being stolen, to the death of the Magistrate, Beryl and Edwina use their sleuthing skills to see if there is anything in common between the crimes, and, if so...what is it? There are definitely clues all along the way, and you will just have to pick up a copy of the book to see!

If you enjoy historical cozy mysteries, I highly recommend this book! It had me reading late into the night to see what was going to happen next! Ms. Ellicott brilliantly weaves the puzzle pieces of the various mysteries together, and I was guessing up until the very end. There were quite a few twists and turns that made my mouth drop. I would love to see many of these characters in future books, and I hope there will be many more novels in this incredible series! Can we please have more of Crumpet in the next novels too? He made me smile so much!

Thank you so much to NetGalley and Kensington Books for the ARC of this novel, and to Kensington Books for sending me a physical ARC as well, I so enjoyed it! All opinions expressed in this review are my own.