Arc Review… Murder Ballad Blues by Lynda McDaniel 📱

Murder Ballad Blues by Lynda McDaniel

Description….Laurel Falls, N.C. 2005 A mysterious death in the North Carolina mountains. Then a second. By the third, the FBI finally gets involved. Trouble is, they’re looking in all the wrong places.

Abit Bradshaw has a theory, but of course the FBI doesn’t take him seriously. When he teams up with musicologist Wallis Harding, bluegrass music becomes more than something to practice and perform. It’s key to finding the serial killer.

Della Kincaid, a former crime reporter in Washington, D.C., can’t seem to escape her past. Now living in the small town of Laurel Falls, she’s busy investigating a fraud case that gets darker at every turn. She’s about to give up when a secretive whistleblower pulls her in again—and back to D.C.

Abit and Della team up once again to convince the FBI to help them with both their crime investigations.

Will Abit and Wallis discover the killer’s pattern … before he strikes again?

Can Della make sense of the whistleblower’s clues before the fraud case is closed for good?

You’ll love this suspenseful mystery because everyone longs to find justice in this crazy world.

Publication date 15/9/2020

https://amzn.to/3fm6hkg *

My Review….

I like a good murder/mystery and this one wasn’t too bad. In fact I could see it as a movie or tv series.

Della is a reporter digging around for the next big story, married/divorced/still seeing her ex/husband/now boyfriend (yeah I got confused too!

She’s known Abit for years and counts him as a close and dear friend.

Vesper junior (Abit) or Rabbit as his wife calls him is happily married with kids and plays in a band with his wife and friends. Life might be dull, but Abit likes it that way thank you.

I felt so sorry for Vesper, he got the nickname because his father always called him “a bit slow”, which got shortened over time. I don’t know if I could be called Abit and know it’s nasty and not a cute nickname!

So we have Wallis and Abit bonding over music and using it to track killers, rather ingenious if you ask me.

Della uses her contacts in the paper to dig deeper, hoping to get a story out of it. But wanting to help the FBI (who she shared a sizzling kiss with!)

Reading the cover I did think a ménage. Sadly no, but in a way I’m glad, I don’t think it would have worked out😉

I liked how we came along for the ride, we saw all the thought processes and saw glimpses of their lives.

But it all gets a little too close to home when Abit’s kids get kidnapped by the killer! Will he be able to raise the ransom money in time?

The killer was pretty smart, and catching up with him was good. And a couple of clues might have you guessing who it might be.

I think there we just a few too many characters in this book, not sure we needed all those extra’s. But other than that, they were all pretty solid.

This book worked backwards, we see Abit running away from the killer, we don’t see who it it, we just see him run…..

Told mainly in Della’s and Abit POV. It needed just a little polishing, I felt something was missing. The connection between Abit and Della was good, the connection between Abit and Wallis wasn’t as well felt.

But I’d happily read another book with these characters in. They did make me smile, and at one point I did get a “scooby doo” moment 😉

🦋

*I am an Amazon affiliate and all the book links are my affiliate links. Using them I do receive a small commission.

Published by jab1969

Hi I’m an avid reader. I also write reviews for the books I read. Come in and say hi. You can find me on GoodReads, Bookbub, and NetGalley 👩🏻‍💻 I also review on an awesome site The Reading Cafe (run by Barb and Sandy) Here is where you can find my reviews…. GoodReads: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/2554108-julie Blog: https://butterfliesandbookshome.wordpress.com Amazon: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/profile/amzn1.account.AE6CRPCCL4KYXEQT3QVUYWHMU2PQ?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_r=2519c90d-0324-4b1e-bc4b-2823175cd9ff&pd_rd_w=1EcDs&pd_rd_wg=e4vg0&ref_=hud_2_gw_profile Bookbub: https://www.bookbub.com/profile/2410833240 BooksBooksandmoreBooks FB page: https://m.facebook.com/Booksbooksandmorebooks-107447111084910/?__nodl&_rdr TikTok www.tiktok.com/@booksbooksandmorebooks69 Instagram https://www.instagram.com/booksbooksandmorebooks1969/ Twitter Link https://twitter.com/julie_burns15 https://www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/2TBKRUYC1R4SC/?ref_=lol_ov_le <img src="https://d1vbo0kv48thhl.cloudfront.net/images/featured_book_reviewer_big.png" https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100027510021994&mibextid=LQQJ4d View more posts