The Dinner Lady Detectives: A charming British village cosy mystery: 1 (The Dinner Lady Detectives, 1)

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I thought the basic premise for the story was appealing, and I enjoyed several scenes, but I found the way in which the mystery played out was disappointing. I can read most books - not very discerning I guess - but even I couldn’t plough my way through this. The plot is great, the character cast is spot on, and the dialogue and humor is so quick, smart, and addictive . If they somehow chose to stop being dinner ladies and start up a detective agency instead, I think it would be great.

The Dinner Lady Detectives: A charming British village cosy

It was very surface-level humour rather than anything particularly clever, but it did get the odd chuckle out of me, and I have encountered far worse attempts at humour, and for the most part it was. Again, in this instalment, a dead body winds up and the couple put their detective caps on, ready to solve all the mysteries that come their way. But Clementine and Margery are suspicious as things aren't adding up, they delve into the death and suspect it's really murder. DISCLOSURE: Thank you to Canelo via Netgalley for providing a digital ARC of The Dinner Lady Detectives by Hannah Hendy for review. Margery and Clementine are convinced there's something far more nefarious going on, and they take it upon themselves to investigate.It's a particularly thorny issue when it comes to cozy mysteries, because you have to balance the quaint light-hearted comedy with the fact that, y'know. This novel is another great addition to the series and Margery and Clementine are still up there with two of my favourite amateur detectives. As things with the strange markings continue to appear and strange goings-on occur, the Dinner Lady Detectives find themselves once again on the front line of solving crime - but are they putting themselves in danger? When their manager, Caroline Hughes dies in a mysterious accident, unperturbed by the danger they could find themselves in, the pair decide to investigate.

The Dinner Lady Detectives By Hannah Hendy |The Works The Dinner Lady Detectives By Hannah Hendy |The Works

I very much enjoyed how Margery is being held back by Clementine this time, when Clementine is always the one dashing headlong into danger. This sounded like a promising cozy mystery involving two older schools dinner ladies solving the murder of their manager but it didn't turn out to be quite as much fun as I thought it would be.There were some very good lines in the descriptions usually that I did find amusing-- Margery bewailing her ancestors settling on a spot centuries ago where the lawn chairs would blow away in a storm, for example-- but other things fell flat for me. These two facts combined mean that I have an extremely soft spot for the elderly, especially senior citizens getting in trouble and solving crimes, and that's probably the only reason I'm giving this 3 stars instead of 2. Clementine is a collection of tics and quirks with no anchor, as if the author decided that "take an asshole but make them an old woman" was enough. Because Clementine seems odd about the death, she pestered Margaery in a cute and hilarious way to find out the truth.