Barbara’s rating: 4.3 out of 5 Stars
Series: Irish Village Mystery #11
Publication Date: 2/25/25
Period: Contemporary Ireland
Number of Pages: 304

Siobhan O’Sullivan is NOT in a good place at the beginning of this book. She’s studying for her Detective Seargent exam; she is having a big spat with her husband, Macdara; the five siblings she’s raised since their parents’ deaths are growing up and leaving home; and she doesn’t feel well. She doesn’t need a murder to investigate on top of all that, but that is what she gets.

Kilbane’s Top Garden Contest is going strong with the five contestants busily preparing their plots beneath concealing tents. The contestants are all very competitive, very secretive, and very diverse in the gardens they are preparing and everyone is excited to see who the winner will be once the gardens are revealed and judged. Siobhan is excited to receive a VIP ticket to accompany the judge to each reveal. Then, maybe she’s not so excited when strange events start at the first garden and continue through the rest – right up to a dead body.

We have suspects of every variety and it is up to Siobhan and Macdara to untangle the twisted clues. They keep circling and circling until one suspect stands out amongst the rest. Is that suspect for real or are they being set up? If not them, who? Everyone seems innocent – and everyone seems guilty – yet it can’t be both ways. I enjoyed this mystery and though I had a suspicion about the perpetrator, I wasn’t sure until the very end. I did think bits of it were far-fetched, but it didn’t detract from my interest in the mystery itself.

I did not enjoy the conflict between Siobhan and Macdara because it seemed very childish on her part. I would have expected a higher maturity level than she displayed with all she has gone through – especially in raising her 5 siblings. To me, it was just a very silly thing to go off the deep end about. I assumed that was to display her current emotional state with all that was happening, so I let it slide. Another thing I didn’t enjoy was the book blurb’s first paragraph where it says Eoin hires a landscape designer so he can participate in the contest and generate business for his new restaurant. He did not it is plain as you read, so I fail to see why that is intimated in the blurb. None of that kept me from enjoying the story – it just nipped at my attention. Also missing is the ‘glossary’ of pronunciations included in some of the previous books. I loved that, but maybe most didn’t. I love those beautiful Irish names and hated butchering them before I found the glossary.

The final chapter in the book is one of the sweetest and most heartwarming I have ever read. I loved it! As a matter of fact, it was so heartwarming that it scared me for a bit because I kept thinking – ‘Is this the last book in the series?’. I cannot find anything that tells me that is the case and with all of the changes and growth that has happened with the characters – ALL of the characters – I can see several ways the series can continue with new and invigorated stories. Or, it can continue right along as it has been and I’ll be perfectly happy.

I voluntarily read an early copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

View all my reviews

The Duke Says I Do by Anna Campbell

Tracy’s Rating: 4.5 of 5 stars

Series: Scoundrels of Mayfair, #4

Release Date: October 24, 2024

While at the docks checking on his business concerns, Alaric Dempster, the Duke of Granville, is shocked to realize the young woman he encountered with a small dog being accosted by thug in an alley is none other than Lady Portia Frain, the sister of his former fiancée. Always the gentleman, Alaric steps in to help Portia, and finds himself the owner of a dog of dubious lineage and a fierce attraction to a woman he thought he disliked. When Portia returns to his house to help him settle in with the dog and his admiration and desire for her only intensified. Over the next few days, they meet in secret and finally give into their mutual attraction. Portia has made it clear that she has no desire to wed, when they decide to take the next step and enter an affair. Alaric has been jilted twice before and has no desire to be rejected a third time but he wants more from her than just an affair, and since his feelings for Portia are unlike anything he has ever felt and he wonders how he is going to be able to keep his heart from being shattered if he can’t convince Portia that she is the woman he has been waiting for all his life.

Portia Frain’s passion is rescuing injured and abused animals, and marriage doesn’t seem likely, especially as she is caring for her father since her mother passed away years ago and her sisters have both recently married. But a chance encounter with the Duke of Granville, the man her sister Juliet jilted a year ago, has her wondering about another type of passion. It is clear that Alaric is not the man she thought he was and her feelings for him are intense and overwhelming and all too soon she finds herself falling in love with him. A feeling that only grows stronger when they embark on an affair. But there are a lot of things that make a permanent relationship between them seem impossible, but no matter how many times she tells herself this, her heart doesn’t seem to understand.

As usual, Ms. Campbell writes a wonderful, passionate, heartfelt story with strong characters who are easy to like and root for. I was a little skeptical when I realized that Portia was the sister of the woman who jilted Alaric in the previous book and wondered if that was going to cause a lot of angst in the this story, thankfully, that was not the case, yes the issue is brought up, but I had no problem believing that Alaric wanted Portia for herself and his former relationship with her sister meant nothing to him. I was also a bit surprised (and delighted) by how steamy this book was (it reminded me of her older books). Overall, I really enjoyed this book, and the epilogue was everything that I could have hoped for and tied up the entire series beautifully. This is the fourth book in the series and while it could be read as a standalone title, I would recommend reading the series in order for the best reader experience.

*I am voluntarily leaving a review for an eARC that I requested and was provided to me by the publisher/author. All opinions in this review are my own. *