Delilah is trying to avoid bankruptcy and is hoping that her dating agency will start to make a profit. Instead, her clients start dying… Samson is persona non grata when he returns to the village to set up a private decteive agency. Can he rebuild relationships and make amends and will he catch a killer?
Date With Death is the first book in a cosy crime series set in Yorkshire.
Samson left under a cloud and hasn’t been back despite some significant events in the village. Locals aren’t willing to forgive him but Delilah has no choice as she needs his rent money! I enjoyed the premise of the book and the way the characters behave as they have to accept change and let go of the past. There is a subtle vulnerability to the two main characters that makes them easy to like.
The murders are not graphically described and the mystery is well maintained. There are plenty of suspects and even Delilah finds herself under suspicion due to her link with the victims. The tone of writing has a light touch and there are elements of humour which counterbalanced some of the big emotions experienced by the main characters. I thought that the audio narration matched the style of the book well.
Date With Death is an enjoyable cosy murder mystery.
Book blurb
Meet two sleuths from a sleepy Yorkshire village as they investigate murders and discover the secrets behind the twitching curtains. Date with Death is the first cosy crime novel in Julia Chapman’s Dales Detective series, perfect for fans of Richard Osman’s The Thursday Murder Club and M.C. Beaton.
Samson O’Brien has been dismissed from the police force, and returns to his hometown of Bruncliffe in the Yorkshire Dales to set up the Dales Detective Agency. However, the villagers aren’t that welcoming to a man they see as trouble.
Delilah Metcalfe is struggling to keep her business, the Dales Dating Agency, afloat as well as trying to control her wayward Weimaraner dog, Tolpuddle, when Samson’s first case – a supposed suicide – takes an unexpected turn, and a trail of deaths lead back to the door of Delilah’s agency.
With suspicion hanging over someone they both care for, the two feuding neighbours soon realize that they need to work together to solve the mystery of the dating deaths. But working together is easier said than done . . .
Full of wit, warmth and characters you’ll care about, continue the murder mystery series with Date with Malice.
