A locked vault cozy mystery during the Christmas season in the year-round Halloween Town of Elyan Hollow that had me craving a cookie pie.
Hysteria at the Historical Society
A Halloween Bookshop Mystery #3
Emmiline Duncan
Welcome back to the hauntingly cozy town of Elyan Hollow, Oregon as it celebrates the winter holidays in a very “Nightmare Before Christmas” way. But what else would you expect from a town that voted to theme the city center with year-round Halloween. There is even a Santa Paws scavenger hunt, which Bailey Briggs, proprietor of the Lazy Bones bookshop helped to organize. I bet you are imagining puppy paws, and you would be wrong because in Elyan Hollow there are a variety of Santa Sasquatch to be found in various stores and locations.
The true nightmare in this cozy mystery seems to stem from the rivaling historical societies. What was once one had become two after a disagreement over coffee, but that was years ago and doesn’t have a bearing on this story. This story is book three of the Halloween Bookshop Mysteries and it does a very good job as a stand-alone cozy mystery. This story starts with a verbal altercation including imputed honor and ends up with a locked vault murder in the town’s new escape room. Bailey might have been able to step back from investigating, if only it hadn’t happened at her friend (with potential) Finn’s new escape room, during the test run and if she and her dad, best-selling horror author Rex Abbot had not been at the scene. So how does a man get murdered in a locked bank vault in such a small group of people? Sounds like an easy one to figure out, right? Wrong. There is more than meets the eye to this location and the participants. First off, the victim, Walter, who was a member of the Historical Society of Elyan Hollow, was a man of unplumbed depths. His best friend Graham Clark, the director of the same society had been seen in an animated discussion with Walter just earlier that day. There are other witnessed confrontations with Karolyn Robertson, the Society’s treasurer, ex-wife Emma and grown sons Daniel and Ant. Last but not least is Jude Collins, the director of Elyan Hollow Historical Society. Jade and Walter had words and Graham made accusations.
Detective Whitlock definitely has his work cut out for him. His wife, Bianca who works part time for Bailey, would really like for Bailey to do that thing that she does so well and help solve this mystery so that Detective Whitlock can spend time with his kids this Christmas. Bailey has her sleuthing cap on and is ready to ask questions regardless of how pointed they may seem with Jack as her wingman or wing dog that looks like a big white abominable snow dog aka a Great Pyrenees, he is truly a gentle giant. That is unless he can sense a bad vibe coming off of someone.
This was a very entertaining holiday locked room who-done-it and while I thought I had figured it out, I was way off. The plot moves the overall storyline ahead at a great pace and there is even a sly little cliffhanger at the end. The only thing that it is missing are some pie recipes to tie in the amazing twenty-four-hour pie vending machine. I went in search for a pie cookie recipe and settled on a pecan pie cookie that is so good!
Thank you to the authors, publishers, and/or NetGalley for providing this ARC in exchange for an honest review. The recipe review and food pairing found on my Instagram feed are of my own doing.
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