Another of the books I read while lazing around, recovering from hip surgery.
Sometimes a cosy mystery that doesn’t challenge the mind can be just the thing!
Chicken Culprit by Vikki WaltonMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
Having started a different cosy and given up within 2 pages, annoyed by the amateurish writing, I was relieved to find this one competently written, even if the frequent formatting errors were slightly annoying.
We are chicken keepers, so the title drew my eye, and then the offer of a country-living themed easy read murder mystery sealed the deal.
Wanting to put the past behind her, Anne buys an old Victorian she plans to do up. Almost immediately she becomes embroiled in local life when she sees one neighbour chasing another neighbour’s chicken, axe in hand, furious to find said hen, Rusty, on his property yet again. Enter ditsy but charmingly sweet hen keeper, Kandi. Rusty escapes her fate, but next morning Anne finds her chicken-hating neighbour dead in his compost heap, and now she’s so involved she needs to discover who dunnit.
This is a charming, easy read, with feeling. I sailed through it in short order and enjoyed it, even though I found it weird that Kandi was so devoted to her slimy husband, and I was irritated by the ‘big reveal’ about who Anne really was. With the story told from Anne’s viewpoint, I felt her thought processes should have given us some subtle clues rather than just landing the truth in one big hit – I felt somewhat misled.
Overall though, if you are looking for a light cosy, with country living as a background, you won’t go wrong with this one.
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deborahjay 
A cozy with an unreliable narrator? That’s unusual. I do like the setting and your review, Deborah.
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Yes, that took me a little by surprise, but it was still a fun read.
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Again, Deb, I appreciate your honesty in reviews. And ya, is there something in the water. I recently started three different books that I decided to stop pushing myself when I wasn’t enjoying, especially after reading a 400 page book I thought I was loving and waiting for plot til midway through the book, which continued to make we wait, to an ending that wasn’t finished and left us out in the cold. And may I say, that book had over 2000 bloody reviews with BS in many of them. Major disappointment, so when I know a story is boring, I will no longer continue to waste my time with so many books I want to read. I have lost the mantra, that if I paid for it, I must read it. Just no. Our time is worth more money. ❤
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Yes, I used to read everything I owned, back in the days when all books were made of paper. It seemed somehow disrespectful not to do so, but nowadays?
I guess having had to work hard at the skills of being an author, we’ve become (rightly) less tolerant of those who can’t be bothered or are in too much of a rush to take the time to learn their craft. It’s disappointing when reviews don’t mention such shortcomings. I guess many readers don’t notice them as much as we do? After all, there are still plenty trad published books out there with glaring errors and typos.
I do always scan the reviews to spot the dreaded cliff hanger endings, and most of the time find someone warning of it.
Dammed annoying when they don’t though!
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You said it. And my bad on this one, because what was puzzling about this book was that over 2000 reviews with a 4 star average is usually a great book, despite my seeing complaints about the ending. I think that was what got me curious. How could those two factors be? 🙂
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An anomaly, for sure.
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Thanks for the review. I thought this was a kids’ book at first from the cover. A cozy mystery works though it sounds like there are a few shortcomings. I also don’t finish books that I don’t enjoy, especially when there seems to be a sloppiness to the story or technical aspects of writing. There are too many good books out there to spend time on ones I don’t like.
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Yes, it’s one of those things that has changed with the advent of self-pub. The main thing is finding quality books in amongst the masses of sub-standard ones on the ‘shelves’.
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[…] This one is for the second in the Backyard Farming Mystery series. You can see my review of the first one, Chicken Culprit, here. […]
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