The Grim Reader

By: Kate Carlisle

Narrated by: Susie Berneis

Brooklyn and her hunky new husband, Derek, are excited to be guests at Dharma’s first annual book festival. The entire town is involved, and Brooklyn’s mom, Rebecca, is taking charge. In addition to all of her other event-related duties, she’s got Brooklyn doing rare-book appraisals and is also staging Little Women, a musical to delight the festival-goers. If that wasn’t enough, she and Meg - Derek’s mom - will have a booth where they read palms and tarot cards.

Brooklyn couldn’t be more proud of her mom’s do-it-all attitude, so when a greedy local businessman who seems intent on destroying Dharma starts harassing Rebecca, Brooklyn is ready to take him down. Rebecca is able to hold her own with the nasty jerk until one of her fellow festival committee members is brutally murdered and the money for the festival seems to have vanished into thin air.

Things get even more personal when one of Brooklyn’s nearest and dearest is nearly run down in cold blood. Brooklyn and Derek go into attack mode, and the pressure is on to catch a spineless killer before they find themselves skipping the festival for a funeral.

©2020 Kate Carlisle (P)2020 Dreamscape Media, LLC

woke

This book could not have been more politically correct. The stories are great, the narrator's giggle outstanding.

This isn’t Harry Potter 🙄

Spoilers:




I got hooked on this series randomly checking out a mystery book at the library. That was book 12. I couldn’t put them down! This book however was a struggle. I didn’t enjoy the crystal/witch/yada yada part of it. We get it. You like witches. I don’t agree with the lifestyle but that is me. 🤷🏼‍♀️ I don’t love it shoved down my throat in a book. 🙄 Her mom and Meg are lovable just as they are, I don’t need to hear about cleansing practices. I already loved her when she was seen in previous books. -sigh- I’m leery about starting another as I’ve been buying them on audible. The plots are so engaging and interesting, and I love everything about the main character and her husband. The writing is great but this aspect was mention so freaking much. 😑 Again, personal preference you can take it or leave it.

ANOTHER BIBLIOPHILE MYSTER6

Every once in a while Audible will miss a book in a series. So here's one to add to the Bibliophile series. it's a fun read that continues the series and characters through more adventures and books.

ANOTHER WINNER

I LOVE THIS SERIES, AND THIS BOOK DID NOT DISAPPOINT. BROOKLYN AND DEREK ARE ONE OF MY FAVORITE COUPLES, BUT THE OTHER CHARACTERS ARE JUST AS ENTERTAINING. BECKY, GURU BOB, ALEX, GABRIEL, DEREK'S PARENTS, THE BROTHERS AND SISTERS ARE ALL JUST DELIGHTFUL. IF YOU KNOW THE SERIES, YOU WILL APPRECIATE THE HUMOR IN THESE TWO STATEMENTS FROM BROOKLYN: "DETECTIVE LEE ALWAYS APPRECIATES MY INPUT" AND (SPOKEN TO DEREK AND GABE) "I'M THE MASTERMIND. YOU GUYS ARE JUST THE MUSCLE." HILARIOUS, FUN, TOUCHING, AND LET'S NOT FORGET THE ACTION. HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS BOOK AND SERIES!

It is scone, not scon, the o is long, gahhhhh

just another cozy mystery, light fluff, still enjoyable. But please, the word is scone, not scon as the narrator kept saying.

Great Story

I wish it been a bit longer. I'm looking for a bit more character development but I'm looking forward to whatever is next for Brooklyn and Derek.

Poorly written with terrible narration

I was looking forward to this listen because I liked a previous cozy by this author in the past. I was disappointed. Granted, the typical cozy mystery is not a deep and complex study in human behavior but this book read like a bunch of California wine snobs who disliked the “box wine” guy, populated with shallow and uninteresting characters. The main character is a young woman named Brooklyn who is married to a man we are told is young, British, former military and handsome. The narrator voices this guy as an 80 year old so the whole dynamic of Derrick being the young, handsome and the competent husband who helps Brooklyn solve a murder was totally ruined. The narration did the bad writing no favors. This might have been a bit more tolerable had I read it instead of subjecting myself to this narrator. Her narration is so slow and poorly done that I can’t possibly recommend this to anyone. But don’t take my word for it. Listen to the whole sample before you pick this!

Lots of filler--weak mystery plot

Great narration as usual. Plot is weak and contrived. Most of the story is day-to-day happenings that don't serve the plot.

Could there be much more whining?

How sad. I was excited for this book to come out. After multiple delays, here it is. I can't even finish it because of ridiculous narrator affectations and a very shallow story line.

It just has no depth

The story line is weak in that it is so unrealistic - the idea you can prevent someone from being part of a public festival because they are mean is ridiculous. Also that someone can threaten another individual with no repercussions - whole thing is absurd