DEATH BY PUMPKIN by Noelle Granger

4 out of 5 stars

On Amazon UK HERE
On Amazon.com HERE
On Goodreads HERE

Death by Pumpkin is a cosy murder mystery (if that is not a contradiction in terms), featuring female sleuth Rhe (pronounced Ree) Brewster, a part-time investigator with the police department in Pequod, Maine.  At the annual Pumpkin festival, an unknown and unfortunate person is crushed to death by a giant.... well, you've guessed it.  Along with her brother-in-law and Chief of Police, Sam, Rhe sets out on a search for both victim and murderer, leading her all over the state and bringing back some blasts from a highly uncomfortable past.

I am not a lover of police procedurals/forensic investigation, etc, but I liked the way this is written - there's a good balance of plot and Rhe's own story (including a frustratingly tangled love life), so that the novel is about her as much as about the solving of the murder (and, indeed, made me want to know more about her past - this is the way to write a series, giving you just enough detail to make you want to read the others!).  There's plenty going on, including another death I didn't foresee and an hair-raising airborne adventure.  It's light in style, with some pleasantly humorous parts in both observation and the convincing banter between characters.  I also enjoyed finding out about the Native American population of Maine, and life in that state; it's one I'd love to visit.

The book is well presented and professionally edited, intelligently written and very readable, and the plot works;  I'd recommend it to anyone who likes a good, clean(ish)-read type of cosy mystery. I haven't read much at all in this genre but I would imagine that it's a very good example of it.