Cozy up with Maia Chance's new series
Bad Housekeeping An Agnes and Effie Mystery by Maia Chance Crooked Lane Books Mystery & Thrillers Pub Date 13 Jun 2017
Review
Dumped by the boyfriend she put through grad school and on the cusp of losing her summer job, things are not going well for Agnes. Faced with living at home and with no job on the horizon, Agnes agrees to help her larger than life Great Aunt Effie refurbish the Stagecoach Inn. Life goes from bad to worse when she and Effie discover the body of Kathleen Todd, the manipulative head of the local historical society strangled at the Inn. Faster than you can say murder, rumors are flying through town - rumors that point to Agnes and Effie. Determined to clear their names, the duo start their own investigation. Between Agnes's determined curiosity and Effie’s flagrant disregard of social moiré, the two manage to question suspects, run down clues and get themselves into a boatload of trouble. While I chuckled more than laughed out loud, I found their antics fun to observe.
Agnes and Effie are quite a pair, and I look forward to reading more of their adventures. Bad Housekeeping isn’t perfect, but it is a delightful cozy that will leave you with a smile on your face.
4 / 5
I received a copy of Bad Housekeeping from the publisher and Netgalley.com in exchange for an honest review.
--Crittermom
Description
When 28-year-old Agnes Blythe, the contented bifocals-wearing half of an academic power couple, is jilted by her professor boyfriend for the town Pilates instructor, her future is suddenly less than certain. So when her glamorous, eccentric Great Aunt Effie arrives in town and offers a job helping to salvage the condemned Stagecoach Inn, what does Agnes have to lose? But work at the inn has barely begun when the unlikely duo find the body of manipulative Kathleen Todd, with whom Agnes and Effie both have recently had words. Words strong enough to land them at the top of the suspect list. The pair have clearly been framed, but no one else seems interested in finding the real murderer and Agnes and Effie's sleuthing expertise is not exactly slick. Nevertheless, they're soon investigating a suspect list with laundry dirtier than a middle school soccer team's and navigating threats, car chases, shotgun blasts, and awkward strolls down memory lane. In Bad Housekeeping, the first novel in the Agnes & Effie cozy mystery series by Maia Chance, danger mounts, deadlines loom, ancient knob-and-tube wiring is explored, and the ladies learn a thing or two about the awful, wonderful mistake that is going back home.
