Review: Southern Discomfort

Title: Southern Discomfort

Series: A Southern B&B Mystery #1

Author: Caroline Fardig

Release Date: 3/6/18

Rating: 3.5/5 Stars

Synopsis from Goodreads: Quinn Bellandini loves her life in Savannah, Georgia, where she runs her grandfather’s B&B with her sister, Delilah. From baking fresh scones and serving up grits every morning to ensuring the guests see the best of their historic city, Quinn can’t imagine doing anything else—even if it means dealing with nuisances like the occasional malfunctioning commode. But when Quinn drops by the local restaurant owned by her friend Drew Green, and stumbles upon a murder, her whole world comes crashing down. Drew’s brother was always a little surly, but Quinn can’t imagine that someone disliked the prickly chef enough to kill him. The police, on the other hand, don’t believe that Quinn was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. Before her guests can even digest the next morning’s gourmet breakfast, Quinn learns that she and Drew are suspects. Drew thinks they should do some investigating of their own. Quinn is pretty sure she’s better suited to playing hostess than amateur sleuth. But with Delilah as her cynical sidekick, Quinn starts looking for the real killer—before she gets put away faster than you can say “sugar.”

My Review: While this was a pretty good start to a new series for me it lacked in a few key areas. The first being that it wasn’t sure what type of cozy mystery it wanted to be. There was a baking/cooking line, a paranormal line, a B&B line and a romance line. I felt like the book could have been better if it had picked one of these and stuck with it. For instance I really enjoyed the little bits about a ghost and I think that would have been a good direction but instead we just g small tidbits of that thrown in. Overall the writing was good and the plot moved along pretty well. The mystery itself was a little meh. There were a ton of suspects and though I didn’t guess who it was I felt like the motive was weak. Hopefully the author focuses the next book a little more because it has a lot of potential!

*I received this book from Netgalley and Random House in exchange for an honest review*