School psychologist Skye Denison has been waiting forever for her happily-ever-after with police chief Wally Boyd. But her bliss threatens to unravel on the very first day of their luxurious honeymoon cruise, when Skye becomes convinced that she has glimpsed her mother on board! Surely even momzilla May wouldn’t have manipulated Wally into booking the same trip that her knitting group is taking…or would she?
May’s possible presence can’t cool Skye and Wally’s ardor on their personal Love Boat, but discovering knitting expert Guinevere Stallings as she lies dying from a stab wound leaves them untangling the clues of yet another murder investigation rather than getting tangled in the sheets. Since Skye found the body, she’s considered a top suspect, but she’s far from the only one. Guinevere’s imperious ways needled nearly everyone, and she left an impressive number of enemies. It’s up to the crafty newlyweds to figure out which of the wronged parties was angry enough to cast Guinevere off…permanently.
For fans of: Jessica Beck
Wally Boyd and Skye Denison are finally husband and wife, and to celebrate, they’re spending a week sailing the Caribbean aboard the Diamond Countess. Sounds like a romantic way to start a new life, right? And it would be – were Skye’s best friend Trixie, Trixie’s husband Owen, and Skye’s parents, May and Jed, not on the same cruise. May claims she had no idea Skye and Wally booked the same trip as her knitting group, U-Knitted Nations, but Skye’s positive she’s there to mettle.
The newlyweds are determined not to let anything or anyone distract them from their honeymoon, but when the woman in charge of U-Knitted Nations is stabbed in the neck with a pair of knitting needles and May becomes the prime suspect, Skye and Wally are forced to set down their champagne flutes and don their sleuthing caps. Can the gang from Scumble River catch the real killer and save the day, or will Skye’s mother be forced to walk the plank for a murder she didn’t commit?
Murder of a Needled Knitter is the seventeenth full-length installment in Denise Swanson’s Scumble River Mystery series. While this book isn’t terrible, there’s not much to recommend it, either. Swanson’s setup is cute; because the story takes place on a cruise ship, it’s essentially a locked-room mystery. Unfortunately, though, while the concept has great potential, Swanson never fully capitalizes on it, nor does she ever successfully establish the stakes. Sure, Skye’s mother is a suspect, but ship security doesn’t seem all that interested in investigating or prosecuting the crime, and because the boat’s at sea, US laws don’t apply, so it’s not like there’s any genuine concern May will be arrested or charged.
The pace is slow; there’s very little action, tension, or drama; and too many scenes do little if anything to forward the plot. Swanson introduces a fair number of suspects with viable motives, but she never really develops any of them beyond rough sketches, and her main characters aren’t terribly well drawn, either. Skye spends most of the book obsessing over calorie counts, drinking Diet Coke, and observing how her new husband’s pants ride low on his hips; Wally runs around giving orders and making suggestive comments about his new wife; and May, Jed, Trixie, Owen essentially function as a Greek chorus. The dialogue is forced and artificial, as are the character interactions. The plot is convoluted, the solution to the mystery feels arbitrary, and the denouement is ridiculous.
I never once found myself thinking about this book while I wasn’t actively reading it, and I never had difficulty abandoning it in favor of other activities. If you’re a fan of Denise Swanson’s Scumble River Mysteries, you may want to borrow Murder of a Needled Knitter from your local library; if you want a mystery that’ll suck you in and keep you guessing, though, you’d best look elsewhere.
Reviewed by Kat
