Customer Reviews

Scots on the Rocks: A Bed-and-Breakfast Mystery (Bed-And-Breakfast Mysteries)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

This is 23rd in the series of Bed and Breakfast mysteries featuring Judith McMonigle Flynn and her cousin Renie, this one is set not in Judith's Seattle Hillside Manor B & B, but in Scotland.

Judith is aging, her hip replacement surgery has slowed her down. Her husband Joe, a retired police detective, and her cousin Renie and her husband Bill conspire to set up Judith with a surprise vacation. Her B & B is staffed with substitute innkeepers, and they are off. Judith is sure the locale is southern California, and packs accordingly.

Unfortunately it is Scotland, a stay in remote Grimloch castle due Joe's police connection, with a promise of some great fishing. The men skip off soon after arrival to fish, leaving Judith and Renie to get to know the Gibbses, the surly and unhappy couple running the castle. They venture into town to get Judith some warm clothing and meet many more eccentric and dysfunctional people, including Moira Gibbs, her husband Harry (grandson of the Gibbses working in the castle); and cranky Mrs. Gunn. Wealthy Moira Gibbs has inherited a large petroleum company, and Mrs. Gunn is running her husband's transport firm and believes in the supernatural.

Soon Philip Fordyce and his young wife Beth, owners of the castle, return early from an island vacation to stay in the private wing. Fordyce runs a company making Scotch whiskey and has a very strange young son, Chuckie, who skulks around the castle being obtuse and nasty.

An explosion on the beach signals the death of Harry Gibbs. Who could have wanted him dead? Was he meddling in his wife's Blackwell Petroleum company too much? The accidental death months ago of Moira's personal assistant, the dashing Italian Davey, is suddenly questioned when his bloodstained coat is found with a note. Then Chuckie begins hinting he knows who killed Harry. Judith and Renie have sporadic and sketchy phone contacts with their fishing spouses, until suddenly they seem to have disappeared.

Judith is her usual kind and inquisitive self; Renie as usual, is always hungry, argumentative and pushy. There are several truly hilarious episodes as they careen around the village of St. Fergna trying to ferret out the facts.

Armchair Interviews says: 23rd in series, and still doing just fine, thank you.

I generally like Mary Daheim and her B&B novels, but this one was just OK. The plot was confusing with a lot of superfluous characters, nonessential subplots, holes, and murders that made no sense, even after everything was explained. It still is not quite clear to me, in fact, exactly why the main murder was committed. The motivation behind some of the other deaths is even murkier. The quirkiness of some of the characters, and the interesting setting -- as well as hopes for a real surprise ending -- kept me reading, but in the end, I was dissatisfied.

About 100 pages TOO LONG! 360 pages for a mystery? Ridiculous. After 250 pages I couldn't follow it and could not care less.

I've loved this series, but this one is below par. I agree with the person who missed Joe as a central character. The cast of characters were all strangers, most of them indistinguishable, one from the other. I kept asking myself who is this person and where does he fit in? You didn't care about who was killed or who killed them.

I hope the next book has more of the charm that has made this series one of my favorites.

-- Pat

This is the first in the series I have read. I got the impression while reading that these characters are well fleshed out in the other stories and have a long history together. That being said, this book doesn't really stand alone very well. I found the number of characters too hard to keep track of and as an introduction to cousin Renie - she was just annoying. (Truly, who draws on an oil painting in someone else's house?) I finished the book just to say I finished it. But it was a long process. If you feel compelled to read this series, get this book from the library.

Judith McMonigle Flynn is happily packing her bags. Her husband Joe, and Bill her cousin Renie's husband have planned a vacation trip for the four of them. It's a surprise, so they aren't telling the cousin's where they're going until they're on the planes.

Visions of Hawaii, or The Bahama's float through her head as she tosses in bathing suits and suntan oil.

Imagine her surprise when on the plane she finds that they're on their way to Scotland. Living in the Northwest, cold and wet are normal for the winter, and although there were probably colder and wetter places than Scotland, she couldn't think of any.

Things are even worse as the cousins realize that Joe & Bill picked the spot, because they had made friends with a local Scottish police inspector and he was going to take them on fishing trip, meanwhile Judith & Renie got to stay at an ancient castle high above the North Sea.

Things get off to a rocky start when there's an explosion at Grimloch Castle and a young man is killed. He's married to the local heiress, lives in a stately mansion and father of a new son. Who would want him dead? Or is the curse some say is on his bride? He was her second husband, her first dying tragically and her male friends who have also died unexpectedly.

Judith and Renie decide to investigate, as there is nothing else to do, Joe and Bill are out of touch on their fishing trip.

There are a lot of suspects and this time the local police are actually asking them for their help. More deaths occur and supernatural things start to happen and then Joe & Bill seem to have disappeared.

The cousins have to solve this crime before they and their loved ones end up having the worst vacation they have ever had.

Highlights:

The last few books in this series have been less than stellar. This one, however, has picked up the series a little.

The mystery, as usual was very interesting, complicated and hard to figure out. I actually thought through most of the book that Joe & Bill may have set them up on some type of mystery weekend type of vacation.

Judith is always a great character. Very smart and does real investigations. You don't get the killer suddenly announcing they're the murderer out of the blue as you do in some series, although she will put herself in danger sometimes because she doesn't always think things out.

Cousin Renie is almost back to her likeable self. Renie has always been overly aggressive and willing to fight physically. But in recent books she has almost crossed the line into insanity, with her constant embarrassing remarks to people and the fact that she will start hitting people without provocation. In this book, she has pulled back a little in her embarrassing actions and although she does get physical with a particular character, it seemed more humorous than the insane way she had done in the past few books.

Lowlights:

Joe and Bill disappear from the book. I love Joe, he and Judith have the most romantic storyline and I love the interplay between them. But for several books, Joe has disappeared instead of being the supportive, helpful character that he started out as. The series has become an almost exclusive Judith & Renie show. I can't remember the last book where her son and grandchildren actually appeared in the story, and weren't just mentioned in passing.

No returning characters. In earlier books you would see a lot more of Judith & Renie's extensive family. Now they almost seem adrift with only themselves and occasionally their husbands to hang on to.

I love this series and although this book isn't in league with the earlier ones in the series, it's an improvement over the last several books. Get the cousins back home, with their extended families and put Renie and Gertrude on some meds.

This series can be saved.

The title is the best thing about this book. The story is extremely depressing and completely devoid of any of the light-hearted snarky humor that is usually in the B&B books. There are definite attempts at humor throughout the story, but they fall like a deflated balloon. The personas of Judith and Rennie are annoying instead of amusing and by the middle of the book I just wanted them to leave Scotland, have a drink at home and consider the day done. I think it's time for Ms. Daheim to close the Bed-and-Breakfast series since her lack of interest in the series is obvious by this latest book.

It is a very, very, very light read. I stopped after about 70 pages. It just wasn't fun for me. Very predictable. Maybe if I'd been on a beach somewhere, drowsing in the sunshine while reading...

I have read and enjoyed most of this series. This is not one of the best. I would agree with the other reviewer that it could have been told much better with 100 fewer pages. There were so many characters to keep track of, I finally gave up and just read to finish the book. I missed Joe, too. It's too long on detail in general, although I do enjoy the relationship between Judith and Serena. I am, however, getting really tired of hearing about Judith's artificial hip. My mom had 2 artificial hips and it didn't slow her down. If you really like the series, I would read this. If not, skip it.

Bed-and-breakfast proprieter Judith Flynn and her husband Joe are badly in need of a vacation. While Judith dreams of a trip to the beach, Joe is planning a "surprise" vacation for her. They are accompanied by Judith's cousin Renie and her husband, Bill. The setting that the men choose is great for their fishing plans but the women aren't so pleased. At least Judith feels that she will be removed from the curse of finding dead bodies, which seems to plague her at the B & B. Unfortunately, this is not the case. A dead body soon appears, and Judith begins her usual sleuthing to try to find the killer. From there, the book becomes so long and tangled that it's difficult to keep the characters and the plot straight. Renie seems to be even more over-the-top than usual and the characters tend to be caricatures. This is not Mary Daheim's best work.