Tannat

Series: Madoc Rhys #1

This book is first in a series that I knew nothing about going into. It’s a cozy mystery wherein an old lady is poisoned by a poorly prepared batch of canned string beans. So dastardly! Janet, her neighbour, harbours suspicions about the circumstances and tries to call in the RCMP (i.e. Madoc).

The setting is a small town in New Brunswick, and I think MacLeod did a good job at portraying the kind of petty viciousness that can fester under the surface in a small community (feuds etc). The dialogue was reasonably snappy too. Overall it was a short and fun read although it’s a good idea to keep in mind that it was published in 1980 and some of the social circumstances definitely speak of that time in a small town. I may look up the next in the series the next time I feel in the mood for a cute cozy mystery that isn’t totally lame. Plus it gets points for being Canadian.

I read this for my first roll in booklikes-opoly, square #8 “Read a book that is tagged mystery” although I can substitute it for my second square (I rolled doubles) #17 “Read a book that is tagged cozy mystery” if anyone disagrees with my book choice for that square.

Since the print copies that I’ve seen have page counts in the 180s, I’m going to give myself $2 for finishing a book in the 101-200 page range (Kobo says 209, but the text finished by page 202/206 [my ereader count] or so and the few pages at the beginning probably make it under 200 anyway).

This brings my bank total to $22.