Murder at an Irish Wedding (An Irish Village Mystery book 2) by Carlene O’Connor
A celebrity wedding in a small Irish village goes from festive to funerary when the best man is murdered in this cozy mystery novel.
Any wedding is a big deal in the County Cork village of Kilbane, but with a local lad marrying a famous fashion model at Kilbane Castle, there’s no talk of anything but the upcoming nuptials. Siobhán O’Sullivan and her five siblings have their plates full catering the three-day affair from their bistro. But the celebratory mood suddenly turns sober when the best man is found murdered in the woods.
For Siobhán, the tragic turn is more than grist for the gossip mill. Her beau, Macdara Flannery, is the prime suspect—and she intends to clear his name. Now, like the bride walking down the aisle, Siobhán needs to watch her step. For as she gets closer to unveiling the truth, the murderer is planning a very chilly reception for her.
Dear Carlene O’Connor,
I really liked the first book in this series, so I bought the second one. I did and still do have reservations about so many murders suddenly happening in the small Irish village, but I figured I would wait and see, maybe I would be able to just roll with it if the story and the characters in each new books would be to my liking.
I have to admire the fact that the author already tries to mix it up a little – the murders in this book may have happened in the village, but both people killed were not from the village and the killer was not from the village either. I am not really spoilering anything here – the blurb mentions that Macdara Flannery is the prime suspect but none of his colleagues treat this seriously and no one is arresting him. Although he is not allowed to investigate, not too close anyway. It was understandable though, the reason for him being a suspect felt as if someone made a clumsy attempt to frame him, so while his colleagues had to acknowledge that, no one really saw him as a killer.
Siobhan is here as the main investigator and man, it felt strange at times. I said it in my review of the first book (or I think I did) – when an amateur investigator starts their investigations in the cozy mystery, I go along with it, because those are the laws of the genre, but I think that the reasons why an amateur investigator is doing the work of the police can be more convincing or less convincing.
I actually thought after reading the blurb that Siobhan would have more of a personal stake in the investigation. Similarly to the first book I was thinking that Macdara would be arrested and totally out of commission, but this is not what was happening. Macdara and his boss kind of want her to investigate at some point of the story, but to me she overstepped all the bounds of believability and when people tell her you are not with the guarda when she attempts to ask her questions, I wanted to scream at her that, yes, she really was not with the guarda.
Of course Siobhan overcomes all the resistance and find the real killer and I did think that the investigation and revelation was really well done if I were to forget my annoyance with Siobhan because I have had no clue till the very last moment as to who the real killer was and when I was looking back, I thought it was ridiculous that I had no idea, because it was right there staring me in the face. I enjoyed that a lot.
I also really really appreciated that Siobhan will have a very legit reason to investigate murders from now on, hopefully it will make my annoyance with her go away.
“Siobhán didn’t admit the worst of it. Ann was right. Siobhán didn’t have to investigate this murder. She could go to the shops like she’d promised. Watch them try on outfits and eat curried chips. She just couldn’t shake the feeling inside her that was driving her to stay and investigate. She wanted to solve this mystery. She wanted to catch the killer. It wasn’t her job, but somehow she felt as if it were. A calling of sorts. “Don’t worry,” Gráinne said. She was still hanging on the staircase. “I have a better sense of fashion than you anyway.” She winked”
Grade B.
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