Murder at Haven's Rock by Kelley Armstrong
Murder at Haven's Rock #1 by Kelley Armstrong
Genre: Mystery
Publish Date: Feb 21, 2023; 352 pages
Thanks so much to #Netgalley and #stmartinspress for the advance reader copy of this book. The opinions are my own.
First Sentence: "Prologue: The longer Penny works on building this strange little town, the more obvious it becomes that the company is lying. Lying about everything."
THE PLOT
A great kick start to a new, but tangential, series with the same characters as the Rockton series, but moving on to a new town and new circumstances. The plot development follows a familiar path of unexpected missing people turning up dead or injured and Casey and Dalton trying to figure out what happened, even as they're watching their new town being built.
Dalton and Casey are on their own for about half the book, with only the specialized building crew in town - so we meet a few new characters. Casey's sister April shows up about half way through to help care for the injured
workers; and the others previous characters not till almost the end of the book. So this story focuses mostly on the building of the new town and Casey and Dalton as they learn their new forest surrounds and meet a "neighbor" - a gold miner.
MY THOUGHTS
Though there's no new plot ground or technique here, the story is still a strong one. The accident/murder/crime is well done and oddball enough to take some head scratching to figure it out. Armstrong's writing is readable and fast paced, which I like, and action packed enough to keep me turning the pages.
This book can certainly be read as a standalone if you never got around to reading the Rockton series. There are a few references to events that happened "back in the day" but nothing critical to the story moving forward.
These are characters and an environment I really enjoy and this story was no let down. I like the more 'settled' Dalton and Casey, married and firm in their love and work/life situation. It looks like there will be a couple new "permanent" resident characters added and their personalities leave lots of room for conflict. I liked every twist and turn of this book and am looking forward to the meeting the new residents of the town in the next installment.
Challenges Tagged:
Cloak & Dagger: 4/36
COYER 1st semester: 7 books read
Literary Escape: 2/51 + 3 bonus
