The Best Way To Spend A Summer Month

The best way to spend June, with the summer weather, the purchase of a hammock, and spending it in Dedley End. Well, in a fictional sense!

When I had gone through my TBR pile last month, I sorted them by genre. When I reached for a new book, I just really fancied a cosy mystery. I had already picked up the first two books in the Dedley end series. After reading the first, I realised there was a third due to be released! Ordered that (as well as a few others…) and spent the month wishing I lived in The Cotswolds.

Jumping into another monthly reading wrap up…

Murder At The House On The Hill by Victoria Walter

The first book in the series introduces you to the charming Cotswold village of Dedley End. We meet Nancy Hunter and her grandmother, Jane Hunter. They run the Dedley Endings Bookshop. A bookshop that specialises in selling crime, thriller and mystery books. 

We also meet Nancy’s beagle, Charlie. Who is obviously the star of this book series!

Nothing ever happens in Dedley End. Well, until the wealthy Roth Family decide to open their mansion for an engagement party. After decades of keeping to themselves, it was a surprise when they practically invited the whole village!

As Nancy, Jane and Nancy’s friend Jonathan take in the house of the mystery family, there’s a scream. Lucy Roth, newly married to Harry Roth, is found dead. 

But, did she fall over the first floor banister, or was she pushed? Nancy, Jane, Jonathan and other friends you meet throughout the book, decide to investigate. And Nancy certainly finds more than she bargained for…

This is the perfect storyline to set up Nancy, Jane and Co. It is that classic whodunnit? cosy mystery, with British country charm.

I really like how Victoria writes her characters. It makes you feel like they are the neighbours you live by or the shop owners you see when running errands. With the character of Nancy, I find when an author writes someone so informed by their past, they can either repeat themselves or forget to create the backstory. I love the character of Nancy. Seeing how she has grown and continues to. How she values her relationships and, just generally, is that person you want as your best friend. 

It is a very different read to the usual cosy mystery story. Where the main character is bursting with confidence and enthusiasm. Nancy really drew me in.

Murder At The Summer Fete by Victoria Walters

This story takes place just 6 months after Murder At The House On The Hill. 

The summer fete is in full swing and Nancy has invited a guest speaker. Crime author Thomas Green, who grew up in the neighbouring village. But something is afoot. Someone is leaving threats against Thomas Green and then the day of the Fete, someone is murdered. In the same way, the victim in Thomas Green’s new book is murdered. 

As Nancy, Jane, Jonathan and Co investigate, they come to realise that nothing is as it seems and no one is as they seem either.

I was expecting a twisty mystery for the second installment of the Dedley End Series and oh wow did I get it!

Without spoiling the story, this is another classic mystery story trope but it’s Victoria Walters. It comes with humour, second guessing yourself and, of course, the lovely relationship between Nancy and her Grandmother. It gives me such nostalgic feelings. Being close to my own grandmothers.

I like how much more of the village and surrounding area we get to read about too. The Cotswolds always seemed like timeless villages to me. The way Victoria has used them to describe her setting bolsters that image. I also enjoyed the normality surrounding the villain of this story. We forget that there are many sides to a person.

Murder At The Village Church by Victoria Walters

After a revelation in the last book, Nancy wants to find her mother. Her mother had abandoned her as a child and Nancy believed she was dead. Until Nancy discovered she had been sighted at a party five months ago.

As she begins her search, a new face arrives in Dedley End. Sebastian Holmes has just been released from a long stretch in prison, after crimes committed when in a gang. 

As Nancy starts to uncover something Sebastian is hiding, another murder happens. But here is the twist…

It happened in a locked Church!

Now, not only has Nancy, Jane, Jonathan and Co got the mystery of her disappearing mother to solve, but now a murder in the village church. 

This is my favourite book of the series so far. Again, the classic mystery trope aside, Nancy’s personal story is so lovely to read. I really like it when I can connect with the main character. In saying that, most people have to have that connection to like a book, but for me, it’s always been a gripping storyline. Like with Gallows Court I read last month. It was a 5* read and I wasn’t the biggest fan of one of the main characters.

I thoroughly enjoyed this series and I hope to hope that Victoria Walters decides to write a few more. I do suspect, giving the ending of the last book, that may not happen. But if she does, I’ll have them pre-ordered so fast!

Is this a series that peaks your interest? Comment below!

As always, thanks for reading…

Hannah Marie x