Book Review (and a Giveaway!): The Spook in the Stacks by Eva Gates

SERIES: A Lighthouse Library Mystery #4
GENRE: Cozy Mystery
PUBLISHER: Crooked Lane Books
RELEASE DATE: June 12, 2018
PAGES: 250

Halloween in North Carolina’s Outer Banks becomes seriously tricky when librarian Lucy Richardson stumbles across something extra unusual in the rare books section: a dead body.

Wealthy businessman Jay Ruddle is considering donating his extensive collection of North Carolina historical documents to the Bodie Island Lighthouse Library, but the competition for the collection is fierce. Unfortunately, while the library is hosting a lecture on ghostly legends, Jay becomes one of the dearly departed in the rare books section. Now, it’s up to Lucy Richardson and her fellow librarians to bone up on their detective skills and discover who is responsible for this wicked Halloween homicide.

Meanwhile, very strange things are happening at the library―haunted horses are materializing in the marsh, the lights seem to have an eerie life of their own, and the tiny crew of a model ship appears to move around when no one is watching. Is Lucy at her wit’s end? Or can it be that the Bodie Island Lighthouse really is haunted?

With The Legend of Sleepy Hollow on everyone’s minds and ghoulish gossip on everyone’s lips, Lucy will need to separate the clues from the boos if she wants to crack this case without losing her head in The Spook in the Stacks, the delightful fourth in national bestseller Eva Gates’ Lighthouse Library mysteries.

Other Books In This Series

The Spook in the Stacks has my dream setting – a library in a lighthouse that the main character lives in. Sign me up for that job, please!

Lucy is a relatable heroine who loves her job and also can’t help but investigate crimes in their small Outer Banks town. She has a bevy of engaging secondary characters to team up with, including the library’s resident cat Charlie who seems to have a knack for crime solving too. Gates does a great job of creating realistic characters without losing the quirkiness common to cozy mysteries – or without making the quirkiness go over the top.

At first I thought the whodunnit was completely obvious. And, with 2 hours left in my reading time, I briefly wondered how much the author could possibly draw this out enough to keep my interest. Well…. silly me. The who that dunnit was not at all the one I just knew it was lol. I’m in a bit of a losing streak lately when it comes to these things which in this case is a good thing because it means the plots lately have been really well constructed.

Bottom Line: The Spook in the Stacks by Eva Gates is enjoyable and entertaining with a fun cast of characters and a to-die-for setting (quite literally for our poor murder victim). A well-done mystery and several interesting subplots – including a bit of paranormal possibilities – will keep your attention from start to finish!

(I voluntarily reviewed a complimentary copy of this book. All views expressed are only my honest opinion.)

My Rating: 4 stars / love it!

Vicki Delany is one of Canada’s most prolific and varied crime writers and a national bestseller in the U.S. She has written more than twenty-five books:  clever cozies to Gothic thrillers to gritty police procedurals, to historical fiction and novellas for adult literacy. She is currently writing three cozy mystery series: the Sherlock Holmes Bookshop series for Crooked Lane, the Year Round Christmas mysteries for Penguin Random House and, under the pen name of Eva Gates, the Lighthouse Library series, for Crooked Lane Books.

Vicki lives and writes in bucolic Prince Edward County, Ontario. She is the past president of the Crime Writers of Canada.  Her work has been nominated for the Derringer, the Bony Blithe, the Ontario Library Association Golden Oak, and the Arthur Ellis Awards.

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