1st book of the Haunted Tearoom series
A new life complete with tea, scones, and… murder?
And let’s not forget the ghost…
When your fiancé ditches you and your mother passes away, what do you do? If you’re April May, you buy a huge Victorian home on a whim and open a tearoom featuring lace tablecloths, exotic teas, and dainty sandwiches.
No one told her the house came with a cat in the attic who might just be guarding a treasure. How else to explain people breaking into her house?
From the moment she moves in, nothing goes right, but her problems seem minor when a dead body turns up in her home. Accused of murder, April teams up with a cantankerous bar owner and a feisty, young antiques expert to solve the crime.
And what about the handsome, arrogant chef in her kitchen who no one else can see? She plans to get medical help for what must be a hallucination, but in the meantime, he’s putting a tasty French twist on her menu.
Still searching for answers to this herself, Alex arrives in New Haven tasked by her mysterious benefactors with monitoring the activities of Yale’s secret societies. These eight windowless “tombs” are well-known to be haunts of the future rich and powerful, from high-ranking politicos to Wall Street and Hollywood’s biggest players. But their occult activities are revealed to be more sinister and more extraordinary than any paranoid imagination might conceive.
Rating
Book
Audiobook
Review
I was looking for a short audiobook, and for the time I listened to it, I enjoyed it enough to stay until the end, which is much more enticing than the beginning.
I like how the main character is impulsive in her decisions. The way she decided it would be her home was a little stressful from the start; even during all the renovations, it seemed like a big house that would never be like before. I was a little lost on how she could have all that money because it looks like the timeline is concise, which is a lot of spending in such a small amount of time. However, when you understand the timeline, it’s a lot more feasible.
As she is new in this town, she doesn’t know everyone, and many people don’t like her from the beginning as she is not from there. However, when she discovers some news about people, it’s sometimes just an info dump as she is told the story, which makes the suspect list a little longer. Also, there are many details about tea and food, which sometimes comes from nowhere, making it sometimes a little repetitive. I’m also worried about how much time she needs to pee daily.
I knew who had done it from an early start. However, the twist was so impressive as it’s so layered, and I feel it’s not finished.
For the audio part, I wasn’t really convinced by it as I couldn’t distinguish the women’s voices, and the French chef’s voice I found it very stereotypical. Nevertheless, the men’s voices were well done.
Even if I found this book a little too basic, I like it enough to continue the series; I will read the second volume, which will decide if I will continue.
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