Saturday, April 16, 2011

A Hard Day's Fright by Casey Daniels

A Hard Day's Fright (A Pepper Martin Mystery)


I love the Pepper Martin series :)  It's like chick lit wrapped in a mystery with a paranormal bow on top.  Pepper is such an interesting character--a survivor with an impeccable sense of fashion.  After the high society world she was groomed for falls apart, thanks to her father & some Medicare fraud, she picks herself up, dusts herself off and gets a job as a tour guide at the local cemetery.  A mishap at the cemetery leaves Pepper with an interesting gift:  she can communicate with the dead.  She can see, hear and speak to them.  Apparently, she is quite a novelty because after word starts spreading around the afterlife, she keeps getting approached by souls with unfinished business.

A Hard Day's Fright (A Pepper Martin Mystery) is the seventh installment in the Pepper Martin series.  Pepper gets approached by a young girl who was murdered in 1966, the night she attended a Beatles concert with some friends.  She needs Pepper to find her body so she can rest in peace.  Unfortunately, her body was never found and Lucy can not seem to leave the Rapid (train) car that holds her last happy memory, so Pepper is basically on her own.  Until, she discovers that Ella not only knew Lucy, but was with her that fateful night at the Beatles concert.

Casey Daniels really surprised me in this one.  I really thought I had it all figured out about 2/3 of the way through the book and actually wondered how she was going to drag the book out for that much longer without Pepper figuring it out--when I found out that I was wrong.  I had a part of the mystery right, but there was so much more going on.  Not only did she provide an interesting mystery, but the changes to Pepper's personal life were pretty remarkable as well.  Now, I can't wait to read the next book in order to find out how Pepper snaps back.

2 comments:

  1. I don't read alot of mysteries, but you have really piqued my interest with this review. I love the chick lit meets mystery idea, and I'm curious about the "mishap" that results in her paranormal gift.
    Do you think I could pick this one up without having read the previous ones in the series?

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  2. I'd start at the beginning. The series pretty much builds on itself, so starting in the middle might be a bit confusing. It's a pretty good series though :)

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