Arsenic in the azaleas

Description

A new cozy mystery series from USA Today best-selling author Dale Mayer. Follow gardener and amateur sleuth Doreen Montgomery—and her amusing and mostly lovable cat, dog, and parrot—as they catch murderers and solve crimes in lovely Kelowna, British Columbia.

Riches to rags. … Controlling to chaos. … But murder … seriously?

After her ex-husband leaves her high and dry, former socialite Doreen Montgomery's chance at a new life comes in the form of her grandmother, Nan's, dilapidated old house in picturesque Kelowna … and the added job of caring for the animals Nan couldn’t take into assisted living with her: Thaddeus, the loquacious African gray parrot with a ripe vocabulary, and his buddy, Goliath, a monster-size cat with an equally monstrous attitude.

It’s the new start Doreen and her beloved basset hound, Mugs, desperately need. But, just as things start to look up for Doreen, Goliath the cat and Mugs the dog find a human finger in Nan’s overrun garden.

And not just a finger. Once the police start digging, the rest of the body turns up and turns out to be connected to an old unsolved crime.

With her grandmother as the prime suspect, Doreen soon finds herself stumbling over clues and getting on Corporal Mack Moreau’s last nerve, as she does her best to prove her beloved Nan innocent of murder

And I thought
A page-turner from line 1.  I could not put this one down. 
Honestly I didn't read the description.  I was just drawn from the title and thought it would be a good read.
It wasn't.

It was a great read

And gets my 'Best Of The Year' award

I didn't expect Doreen to walk all 3 pets Dog, Cat and Bird through town.  I giggled.

I didn't expect such endearing characters and pets.

Doreen is likeable even though she is a bit clueless which made her that much more endearing. I just 'felt for her' in all her clueless including not knowing how to make Tea or Coffee.

But give her a murder to solve and keep her Nan out of prison and Doreen excels in knowing who to ask questions (the neighbors) and how to get clues through inter-net searches and the library.

And she gets help from hunky Corporal Nick Moreau in solving 'his' investigation.

The sparks fly between the two and I kept waiting for 

'The Kiss' And still waiting BTW.  

But the reader is 'set-up' for more when the epilogue leaves a cliff-hanger with bones (?) buried in Nicks moms backyard.

I can not wait  to read book 2 and the rest of this 13 book series.

If you love a great Cozy series this is one you'll want to dig into!

Buy the book