Review: The Body in the Back Garden (Crescent Cove Mystery) by Mark Waddell
In this queer cozy series debut perfect for fans of Ellen Byron and Ellery Adams, Luke Tremblay is about to discover that Crescent Cove has more than its fair share of secrets…and some might be deadlier than others.
Crescent Cove, a small hamlet on Vancouver Island, is the last place out-of-work investigative journalist Luke Tremblay ever wanted to see again. He used to spend summers here, until his family learned that he was gay and rejected him. Now, following his aunt’s sudden death, he’s inherited her entire estate, including her seaside cottage and the antiques shop she ran for forty years in Crescent Cove. Luke plans to sell everything and head back to Toronto as soon as he can…but Crescent Cove isn’t done with him just yet.
When a stranger starts making wild claims about Luke’s aunt, Luke sends him packing. The next morning, though, Luke discovers that the stranger has returned, and now he’s lying dead in the back garden. To make matters worse, the officer leading the investigation is a handsome Mountie with a chip on his shoulder who seems convinced that Luke is the culprit. If he wants to prove his innocence and leave this town once and for all, Luke will have to use all his skills as a journalist to investigate the colorful locals while coming to terms with his own painful past.
There are secrets buried in Crescent Cove, and the more Luke digs, the more he fears they might change the town forever.
Review:
Dear Mark Waddell,
This is another impulse buy for me (another very expensive one but I get so few good finds these days that I try them where I can find them :). I really liked your story. Readers be warned before you proceed though, this is a cozy mystery and thus follows some requirements of this sub genre. As the blurb tells you, the events unfold in the small town/village, where our main character Luke arrives after learning about the sudden death of his aunt, whom he used to visit a lot when he was a teenager, but then stopped for many years after coming out to his family.
Luke comes back because he is notified that his aunt left him everything she owned, specifically the cottage as well as antiques store she had. As the blurb once again tells you, Luke’s plans to sell it all go awry very quickly after an aggressive stranger demanded to be allowed into the cottage and such stranger ended up dead. And for a period of time Luke ends up being the chief suspect in that guy’s murder.
I always say this when I review a cozy mystery that I am okay with suspending my disbelief about an amateur detective investigating the murder because this is one of this sub genre’s requirements, however it is nice when the story does not demand *too much* suspension of belief and while this is not the first story I have read where the main character temporarily becomes a detective because he himself was accused of murder and has a very personal stake in clearing himself in the eyes of law, this was believable enough for me. Besides, Luke is an investigative journalist, so at least he knows how to investigate stuff.
Overall I thought the investigation was decent, even if Luke was given one of the major clues in the case by accident. I also really liked how the author avoided what I consider another pitfall of the cozy mystery. An amateur detective usually needs to confront a potential murderer, and more often than not the final scene makes him look quite stupid, because one way or another our main character often would rush to the confrontation in the half baked way without informing the police, or the police won’t answer their phones, or what say you.
In this story the murderer actually forces the confrontation on Luke first before Luke actually figures out who that person is. Luke did not have much choice so to speak and he certainly did not force anything. I really liked that.
You may ask me whether there is a romantic storyline here. There is definitely one, but very restrained and the very beginning of something I really liked and believed in. But as the story is a mystery, at most it is a beginning of the romance. As a romance lover I actually also quite liked how the author handled that. The characters may have met when they were teenagers, and they may have remembered their friendship (for one of them at first even recognizing another was a problem), but they were not pining after each other all these years. It is just when they met again as adults, they found there was something between them worth pursuing.
I enjoyed the writing a lot too and would be delighted to read more adventures if the author chooses to write more. B+
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You’ve piqued my interest, Sirius, so thank you! I’m off to get a sample.
There were parts of this story I really liked. However, there were a couple things that bugged me–mostly things that are typical to cozy mysteries.
My first issue come up quickly, and that was lying (by omission) to the police. Particularly because he had grounds to the thing he failed to share and there was a witness. That felt like stupid mistake.
My second issue was with the scene at the hotel. As soon we saw what was happening I (mentally) yelled at the main character not to be so stupid, because I knew precisely what was going to happen.
This may be because I read a lot of cozy mysteries, but I prefer it when people have respect for what the police are capable of learning/discovering.
I’d be willing to give another book a try, in the hopes it might be done with all the cozy mystery tropes that tend to annoy me. Because I did like the writing and the characters,
One other quibble–why on earth didn’t his aunt write him a letter when she made her will? That could have been given to him with the will? It feels like something one would do when making a will with an unexpected inheritance. (Also, as someone dealing with inheritance and probate, I giggle at the idea of being able to deal with everything in a week. If only!)
Random Michelle thank you so much for coming back and letting us know what worked and what did not work for you . Eh I accept as a given that in every single cozy mystery there will be eye rolling moments due to the fact that amateur detective will be investigating the mystery and not the police . So honestly to me it is the matter of degree which eye rolling moments I can tolerate more or less . The first two moments didn’t bother me at all, but I understand how it could have bothered another reader .
And when some time passed after reading the book I still think that author minimized some other potential eye roll that I may have had . Like I really really appreciated that he avoided having his main character deciding that he will go and confront the murderer all by himself because he knows better than the police . I thought having murderer coming to our hero first was clever .
Not sure how the letter from the aunt would have helped? Oh you mean to avoid all the she didn’t love me angst ? I guess so and I will agree about inheritance being handled in a week being a funny moment .
@Sirius:
I did appreciate the not storming off to confront the murderer–I just find it aggravating when otherwise smart people fail to realize the police are not great fools. (I think it bugs me mostly because if the main character wasn’t white, he wouldn’t have been able to get away with that stupidity–but that’s a whole other can of worms.)
As far as the aunt, it just felt weird to me that she would not have written him a letter when she made her will. She was written as a kind and loving woman in all other respects, and I can understand not wanting to reach out in life for fear of causing further hurt or being rejected. It just seems bizarre to me that someone of that temperament would not have have wanted to leave their own apology.
It is *definitely* a nit I’m picking here, it just nagged at me because it felt out of character in a way. (OK, there is probably some personal baggage here as well, if I’m being honest.)
No no what you said about aunt makes sense to me . I didn’t consider it when I read but it makes sense .
That’s the thing though . I don’t remember reading a single cozy mystery where amateur detective at least once or twice thinks that police are fools you know ? To me it goes as one of the main rules of this subgenre . Normally the amateur detective won’t be allowed to investigate the mystery no? So unfortunately taking police for fools will happen solely because of that . Some authors mitigate it better some worse but every author I read had it to some degree . Imo of course .
This should say at least once or twice doesn’t think that police are fools . Sorry
That is probably why I tend to dislike the first books in many cozy mysteries–they tend to use the same tropes in a way that bugs me after I’ve read a hundred or so. ;)
As far as American contemporary cozy mysteries that don’t use those tropes, there aren’t a ton. I think it’s much easier to do with historicals.
Richard Osman’s Thursday Murder Club series does a good job, however, one of the main characters is a former intelligence agent and sometimes does know better than the police. Not queer, but has queer characters in later books. ;)
IMO Nicole Kimberling does a good job of avoiding some of the tropes that annoy me the most. Her most recent, Mystery on the Menu, is on my top ten list for the year (But not a true cozy, because there is boinking).
The first book in Josh Lanyon’s Secrets and Scrabble also did a decent job IIRC (it’s been awhile tho I did prefer the later books).
Alexia Brown’s Gethsemane Brown series (Not queer. I am so sad her publisher dropped this series),
Dahlia Donovan’s Grasmere Cottage series did a decent job–his boyfriend is set up for murder, and he gets involved because his BF has ASD and jail is driving him into himself (it also gave him an excuse of stupid mistakes, as he’s freaking out about his BF’s mental health).
Last one: Raquel V. Reyes’s Caribbean Kitchen Mysteries. Not queer. I *loved* the main character and that she was married and this no possible future romance with investigating cop. ;)
@Random Michelle: Thanks for the recommendations. I love “Thursday murder” series, I reviewed all of them here :), will start the last one very soon, I did not think of them as cozy though because even though the fabulous four lives in a small village the scope of their investigation is usually more broad? But I guess it can count as such. Although, I am not sure I quite agree that first book did a perfect job on dealing with police either. I kinda felt they very much took the police for fools – charming them, making sure they will learn all the necessary information, which police really had no business on sharing. Second book IMO did a better job though.
Agree on Nicole Kimberling. Josh Lanyon became such a massive, massive disappointment for me that I am not sure – I abandoned those series after three or four books. I never heard of the rest of your list though and will definitely check it out thank you so much!
@Sirius: Oh, interesting!
I tend to think of cozy as no on the page gore, violence, or sex. I never really thought about the scope of the mystery as part of being a cozy. Hmm.
I think Elizabeth believing she’s the smartest person in the room is a big part of those stories, rather than her thinking the police are fools. One keeps waiting for Elizabeth to be wrong about that, but, not so much yet. I’m trying to catch up on some of my book backlog before I get the latest Tuesday Murder Club. :)
Lanyon’s Secrets and Scrabble is something I know I’ll be fine with. Don’t love them, but they’re a comforting escape. (Nothing awful is going to happen! Yay!) But, now you mention it, I’d go back and reread Come Unto These Yellow Sands for the umpteenth time just as readily as I’d read another Secrets and Scrabble.
I really hope you like the Gethsemane Brown series (Alexia GORDON). I do have some issues with the mysteries, but I love the characters so much I let those issues slide. I mean, female conductor who sees ghosts is not a character you come across often.
@Random Michelle: Oh definitely, no gore, violence or sex is a feature for cozy in my head as well. I don’t know where I got the idea that it should be in the small place as well, and investigation is limited by town or village, etc. I could be totally wrong.
@Sirius: Wow. The internet is all over the place with cozy rules. No sex and no gore are consistent, but otherwise?
I mean…
” In cozies, the main character is not law enforcement, is normally female, and is often in her forties or over. ”
Now I feel as if I should tell people my age as, “well, I’ve been capable of being a cozy mystery protagonist for about a decade”
I feel like the best definition of a cozy is, “the opposite of noir”