Murder at the Book Club

Murder at the Book Club written by Betsy Reavley.  

This is the first in a cozy mystery series. 

It is entertaining but not that intriguing.  There are so many characters it is hard to keep them all straight. The book very much follows the cozy formula with a set up of the book discussion group, most of the characters being introduced, then a murder, then some clues and another murder and the murder revealed and the conclusion to pull it all together.  Slow and not very interesting dialog and so many sad unhappy characters.

The idea for a mystery novel about a book club is a clever idea but this book does not take full advantage of the medium to use the sources available to its full potential.  You could develop the characters according to types of books they like to read.  You could explore different kinds of mystery novels they could be reading and see if that makes them more likely to be the killer depending on how the victim had been murdered.  So many ideas come to mind and this author did not take advantage of any of these thoughts.  All the characters are sad depressed and have problems in their lives.  So sad.  

I did not like any of the characters and was not drawn in enough to want to try and figure out who done it.  I just kept reading to see how the author would pull it together at the end.  Not so convincing.