Series Redux: Fixer Upper Mysteries

Number 11 in the Fixer-Upper series – The Knife Before Christmas came out on Tuesday – and as I said in the Christmas series post, this one getting a hardback release, which is new thing for the series and probably a positive sign for the health of the series. And as I do love a series of mysteries about house renovating I thought I’d take an opportunity to talk about them, especially as this is probably the best of the construction-set mystery series that I’ve read – because (and this is a common theme with series that I like) the lead character is good at her job, and her competence (or otherwise) isn’t really used as a plot point.

Our detective is Shannon Hammer, who runs a building contractors in a small town on the California coast. Over the course of the series she’s worked on all sorts of buildings – as Lighthouse Cove has plenty of historic buildings of various types and Kate Carlisle has been able to invent more when necessary without it seeming weird! Shannon has a solid group of friends at the start of the series and has added a love interest as well – which has been a pretty slow burn, which again I like because it’s annoying when (mostly) heroines are married off fast because authors seem to find it harder to find scenarios to put them into after that point – particularly when kids appear for female leads. The blurb for this one has her working at a hotel in the town who are famous for their events between Thanksgiving and Christmas. The family of the owners are less keen on the festivities than their parents are, on account of their potential inheritance – and then of course someone turns up dead. It sounds like a lot of fun – and it’s a shame that I’ll probably have to wait a bit to read it, on account of that non-matching hardback. Hey ho. I’ll get there in the end though.

You can buy it now though, if you’re a kindle reader or don’t mind that non-matching thing – here are the Kindle and Kobo links. You probably won’t be able to find the book in shops – I don’t think I’ve ever seen them in a UK store, but you should be able to order it in.

Have a great weekend!