Middle Sister's May Reads

It looks like I didn't read a lot this month, but I was trying to get caught up with the teetering pile of several years' worth of magazine (barely made a dent in that TBR mountain). But I did read the latest int hat's becoming a reliable favorite for me, the Deputy Donut series.

Double Grudge Donuts by Ginger Bolton I've really come to like Emily Westhill, the protagonist for the Deputy Donut series. Her police office husband was killed, and over the series. she's rebuilt her life, maintained her relationships with her former in-laws, and worked hard to make her business a success. I hate it when amateur detectives go haring off following clues or tailing people and they're supposed to work for a living, especially when they own the business. Emily does do some stupid things that once in a while irritate me, but she's generally level-headed protagonist for us to experience the mystery through. And I like Fallingbrook as as small town--large enough for all these characters and businesses, but small enough to take advantage of the things a small town offers to a mystery writer. In this entry in the series, it's just 2 weeks until Emily and Brett's wedding. A sudden murder means Brett is distracted from wedding planning, so he's not aa central a character as he has been in previous stories, but that allows secondary characters a chance to step up and provide an expanded viewpoint. While I did enjoy the mystery, I have to say the basic raison d'être for the mystery, the Fallingbrook Arts Festival, was just not realistic. Sure, a normal arts fair has been the setting for other mysteries and allows an element of competition and strangers to be part of the story, but the construction of this one is odd: the contestants go door to door to all of the businesses every day and sing or dance or act a scene out for the public. Every day? In front of each and every business on the street? Does every storefront in Fallingbrrok have an outside patio where people can sit and watch? This just seemed really bizarre to me, although I admit I am from NJ and now live in the Wild West, so maybe this kind of festival is common in the Midwest. If it is purely an author's invention as a way to have different suspects present themselves to Emily so she doesn't have to leave the doughnut shop, it fell very flat for this reader. And I love bagpipe music, so everyone complaining how awful bagpipe music is made me a little sad. This is book 10 in the series, so it does get harder for authors to conjecture ways to get the main character involved in a murder, especially in a small town, so it's inevitable that one will be unbelievable. Still, it's a fun read, with likable characters in a setting I enjoy visiting, so Recommended. (Net Galley).