good beginning but read on

Bed & Breakfast Bedlam

by Abby L. Vandiver

Wow--good beginning! For reasons never fully explained, the main character "Logan"--stupid name for a woman--is attempting to break into a restricted area in the dark to explore some ruins. It was a totally ridiculous premise, but in reading mystery fiction you sometimes have to let logic go and flow with the current. I did, and I enjoyed.

The real star of the show was the aged lady (in her 90s, according to Logan) who decides to solve the murder and takes over Logan as a driver and all-around assistant. She was a hoot.

I'd recommend this as a "rolicking good tale", but only if you're a fast reader who can let the typos go. When I was done with my Kindle copy, I went back to see if there had ever been a print edition, and apparently there was a paperback. The publisher is listed as Media Web Publishing Inc. but the paperback is marked "independently published." Which maybe explains things. I saw no misspellings, thanks to spellcheck, but the author must have turned off grammar check. Some phrases were misplaced, or confusing out of context, or just plain made no sense. And there were at least two places where the wrong word had been typed (or suggested by spellcheck). There may have been more--I have a habit of blipping over such things unless I'm proofreading.

So, if you like cozy mysteries with unusual turns and twists, and if you can ignore a lot of blazing coincidences and a grammatical howler or two, you will enjoy this. For me it was too shallow--too flimsy. I want some sand in my stories.