3 out of 5
I would like to thank Angie Fox for allowing me to be a member of her Review Crew and for sending me a free electronic ARC of this book, obligation free!
‘Pecan Pies and Dead Guys’ is the seventh book in Ms Fox’s ‘Southern Ghost Hunter Mysteries’ series and does not disappoint! Okay, so yes I didn’t rate it as high as I have rated some of the other books in this series, but I will explain that later. This is just meant to be the attention grabbing paragraph to truly sell you this book. 😉
In this tale our beloved heroine Verity is back on the case. This time she is trying to find a murderer at a three day party. The twist is that the party happened almost a century ago and the ghostly party goers have had to have the exact same party every year since… so are well rehearsed at it and know how to hide the truth.
This part of the story I loved. It is what makes the ‘Southern Ghost Hunter Mysteries’ such a great series. These windows into the past that need help at being closed so the ghosts can move on and find their rest. Fantastic!
It was the twin storyline in the living world that I wasn’t such a fan of. Every Verity tale has her investigating mysteries in both the land of the living and the dead… but I just found the living mystery in ‘Pecan Pies and Dead Guys’ wasn’t as seamlessly entwined into the tale as well as they have been in the past. In places it almost seemed stapled in to ensure there was that living mystery to solve at the same time as the ghost one. It was more a forced inclusion than a natural flow.
But we all know I am a cynical cow and so what would I know, right? Remember that mantra for when you don’t agree: “Pffft, what would SHE know?” 😉
I can’t say this less than smooth weaving of living mystery and ghostly mystery was bad enough to put me off the story – far from it! I still absolutely enjoyed ‘Pecan Pies and Dead Guys’ and don’t feel let down or disappointed in it at all. I guess it was more of a mild jarring annoyance than an actual issue.
But other than that everything was its usual top notch entertaining read. Verity, Frankie, Ellis and – the star of the books 😉 – Lucy were all there in fine form, along with all the other cast of regulars. The story fit well into the series and really does keep the love of Sugarland alive for the fans.
I will say here that, being an ARC, the copy I read had some proofing issues and plot inconsistencies in it, but I have been assured by Ms Fox’s lovely assistant that these should all be sorted out now and those final, tiny little creases, smoothed out.
Would I recommend this book to others?
Yes I would. You know I am going to say it… As this is the seventh book in a series I would strongly recommend people read the whole series from book one. I mean, you COULD read this as a stand-alone novel, but you really would be missing out on other great stories that lead up to ‘Pecan Pies and Dead Guys’.
So I guess I could say this book would encourage me to recommend the whole series so far.
Would I buy this book for myself?
Yes I would. Seriously, any issues I had with it were really minor. Yes it’s not my favourite book in the ‘Southern Ghost Hunter Mysteries’ series, but hey! These things happen in any series. You will always have that one book you prefer over the others, even if you love them all.
In summary: Fans of the ‘Southern Ghost Hunter Mysteries’ series will not be disappointed by ‘Pecan Pies and Dead Guys’. If you’ve been hanging out for book 7, go get it today!
Until next time,
Janis.
Janis's Journal 