Book Review (and a Giveaway!): Film Crews and Rendezvous by Heather Weidner

Posted November 25, 2022 by meezcarrie in contemporary, cozy mystery, giveaway, Heather Weidner, mystery/suspense / 2 Comments

FILM CREWS & RENDEZVOUS by Heather Weidner
SERIES: Jules Keene Glamping Mystery #2
GENRE: Cozy Mystery
PUBLISHER: Level Best Books
RELEASE DATE: October 25, 2022
PAGES: 240

Hollywood has come to Fern Valley, and the one stoplight town may never be the same. Everyone wants to get in on the act.
The crew from the wildly popular, fan favorite, Fatal Impressions, takes over Jules Keene’s glamping resort, and they bring a lot of offscreen drama and baggage that doesn’t include the scads of costumes, props, and crowds that descend on the bucolic resort in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Added security, hundreds of calls from hopeful extras, and some demanding divas keep Jules’s team hopping.
When the show’s prickly head writer ends up dead under the L. Frank Baum tiny house in what looks like a staged murder scene with a kitschy homage to the Wizard of Oz, Jules has to figure out who would want the writer dead. Then while they are still reeling from the first murder, the popular publicist gets lost after a long night at the local honky-tonk and winds up strangled. Jules needs to solve both crimes before filming is canceled, and her business is ruined.

Other Books In This Series

Longer review coming later…

Bottom Line: Hollywood, glamping, and murder… oh my! Film Crews and Rendezvous by Heather Weidner had me at the Blue Ridge Mountains setting (aka, one of my happy places) and then kept me engaged by the various layers to this murder mystery. As the title suggests, Jules’ glamping resort is overrun by a film crew – and the crowds it attracts – and trying to keep up with who is rendezvousing with who (all off-scene) becomes an almost full-time job for poor Jules. All in the name of investigating the double murder, of course. The author does a great job of setting the scene and moving the mystery along at a steady pace. Sorting the clues from the misdirections will take some skill for readers-slash-armchair-detectives and keeps us invested in the outcome – a cleverly-crafted outcome, at that. Also, I want the tiny homes at Jules’ resort to be real because I want to stay in the Rowling one. Such a fun idea!

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

My Rating: 4 stars / enjoyed it!

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Through the years, Heather Weidner has been a cop’s kid, technical writer, editor, college professor, software tester, and IT manager. Film Crews and Rendezvous is the second in her cozy mystery series, the Jules Keene Glamping Mysteries. She also writes the Delanie Fitzgerald mystery series and the Mermaid Bay Christmas Shoppe Mysteries (2023). Her short stories appear in the Virginia is for Mysteries series, 50 Shades of Cabernet, Deadly Southern Charm, and Murder by the Glass, and her novellas appear in The Mutt Mysteries series. She is a member of Sisters in Crime and active in Central Virginia, Chessie, and Guppies Chapters, International Thriller Writers, and James River Writers. Originally from Virginia Beach, Heather has been a mystery fan since Scooby-Doo and Nancy Drew. She lives in Central Virginia with her husband and a pair of Jack Russell terriers.

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