Book Review (and a Giveaway!): A Field Guide to Homicide by Lynn Cahoon

A FIELD GUIDE TO HOMICIDE
SERIES: Cat Latimer Mystery #6
GENRE: Cozy Mystery
PUBLISHER: Kensington
RELEASE DATE: January 28, 2020
PAGES: 288

Cat Latimer and her writer’s retreat group go on a hiking trip—but a murderer has been lurking off the beaten path . . .

Cat’s sweetheart, Seth, is going all out on an outing into the local mountains—for the benefit of the writing group Cat’s hosting at her Colorado B&B. But when they try to identify some plant and animal life, they find death instead. The body belongs to a man with a gold claim a few miles away. Instead of striking it rich, he’s been struck down.

To his surprise, Seth recognizes the victim from his military days—and up to now believed he’d already died during his last tour of duty. Now Cat has to solve this mystery before the killer takes a hike . . .

Other Books In This Series

I love Cat Latimer! And Shauna and Seth and Uncle Pete and Shirley. I love that these 5 core characters stay the same in each novel. Their friendships are the kind you hang on to for life, and because of these solid relationships we get to explore more layers to each character, including some emotional backstories. This brings the characters more fully to life and keeps us invested in them – and the series.

I also love that we get to meet a whole new cast of supporting characters in each novel, thanks to Cat’s writing retreat B&B. Sometimes they have a lot to do with the case (whether investigating it with Cat or being the ones murdered or murdering lol) and other times they’re mainly there to help advance the plot in other ways. No matter which of these is true in A Field Guide to Homicide (no spoilers lol), if you follow the series you know that they are interesting characters in their own right who will teach you a bit more about the writing process too.

The addition of Seth’s army buddies in this latest book laid the foundation for a complex mystery, as well as giving us a more detailed peek into Seth’s army years and his perspective on the time when he and Cat had broken up & she’d married Michael. This made me even happier that they’ve found each other again and that their old feelings have been rekindled. And yes, I even swooned a couple of times (but don’t worry – if you prefer your cozies without romance, it doesn’t dominate the story, I promise).

Bottom Line: There’s a reason that Lynn Cahoon is one of my top 5 fave cozy mystery authors, and she proves it once again in A Field Guide to Homicide. The mystery, the characters, the setting – all are carefully placed & vividly drawn. But she also takes the storyline, the layers, the emotions deeper and more complex than a typical cozy and it’s this skill that elevates her to be one of the very best in this genre – and it makes A Field Guide to Homicide one of my fave reads of 2020 so far.

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

My Rating: 5 stars / Love it!

Lynn Cahoon is the award-winning author of several New York Times and USA Today bestselling cozy mystery series. The Tourist Trap series is set in central coastal California with six-holiday novellas releasing in 2018–2019. She also pens the Cat Latimer series available in mass market paperback. Her newest series, the Farm to Fork mystery series, debuted in 2018. She lives in a small town like the ones she loves to write about with her husband and two fur babies. Sign up for her newsletter at www.lynncahoon.com.

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