Parnell HallRezensionen

The first clue came with a corpse. The body lay next to a gravestone in the Bakerhaven Cemetery. Police Chief Dale Harper stood in the pouring rain and looked down at it with displeasure. What was a corpse doing in the cemetery? Chief Harper was not unaware of the humor in the question. A body in the cemetery - the press would have a field day. Chief Harper frowned and wiped the water off his face.

I love puzzles and I love books so a book about puzzles was always going to be a winner. I loved it. Still it wasn't without it's issues and I'm sure not everyone will enjoy it.

Cora was hilarious. She's such a nutter. I loved the whole cast of characters, Cora, Chief Dale Harper, Sherry and Aaron. The dialogue was fast and snappy with lots of word play. The murder itself wasn't terribly original - it was pretty obvious who the murderer was from the start but I did enjoy getting there. And there were a lot of laughs along the way. 3.5 stars, rounded up to 4.

I Love Stuart Woods and I enjoy the Teddy Fay series. It's nice not having all the sex going on like in the Stone Barrington books! Looking forward to more antics with Teddy.

3.5 stars. A quick read. I'll look up the rest of the series.

Fairly interesting.

3 stars
The title of this book tells you everything you need to know about the book, I remained Puzzled until the very last chapter where Cora the Puzzle Lady explains this convoluted farce. I was completely entertained by Cora’s outrageous actions throughout the book. The solution that the film processor got caught because he never noticed the pinup shot of Cora’s niece Sherry, is just as insane as the rest of the book

Cozies Reading Challenge

A local crime boss is seeking retribution against movie producer, Billy Barnett, having no idea he is trying to kill ex-CIA operative, Teddy Fay. Most of his wiseguys cannot find Barnett, and those that do are no match for his prodigious skills. Meanwhile, Bombshell Vivica is trying her best to smear Tessa Bachetti, who is her competition for Best Actress in the Academy Awards. However, she ends up being cast in a new Peter Barrington movie with her and they develop a friendship. Her overly protective ex-military boyfriend and a hitman decide the Awards ceremony is D-day. Pretty weak.

How come Stuart Woods doesn't know that it's been many years since the words "the winner is" were replaced by "the Oscar goes to"?

Da grande amante dei cruciverba e dei gialli, non potevo farmi sfuggire questo libro che li fonde insieme: un'idea originale che l'autore ha saputo gestire con abilità, creando un cozy mistery piacevole e coinvolgente.
Gli elementi del genere ci sono tutti: un delitto efferato in una rispettabile cittadina in cui tutti si conoscono, una protagonista brillante ed eccentrica (con l'immancabile nipote-spalla più posata e pragmatica) e dei toni leggeri e vagamente ironici; la tensione c'è, ma è più mentale che emotiva. Insomma un prodotto confezionato a puntino e pensato per un target specifico, che non resterà deluso. Il che non significa che sia un'opera priva di difetti: c'è qualche ingenuità di troppo e ogni tanto si nota che la trama è stata tirata per le lunghe, ma soprattutto i dialoghi (in particolare tra i due "giovani") risultano forzati. Non si può trasformare ogni conversazione in duello verbale, è divertente all'inizio ma in breve tempo diventa stucchevole.
Sommando pro e contro, però, il bilancio resta comunque positivo: è un giallo senza pretese, a cui non si chiede altro che di intrattenerci per qualche ora e che assolve il compito piuttosto bene, lasciandoci anche la curiosità di leggere i volumi successivi.

A "clean" mystery by Stuart Woods, lol! I was very much entertained with this one, and Teddy Fay is a great character who wears many hats, once a spy ....

Not much of a mystery nor really any need for the puzzles.

I never knew that competition for the Oscars was so competitive…or so dangerous…but it has two Hollywood starlets considering murder. I first met Teddy Fay back when the Will Lee series first started and Teddy worked with the FBI in Washington D.C. and then came along Ed Eagle series and the Holly Baker series where Teddy was computer genius at gathering and secret information for the government. These were all excellent books that were action packed...short on wasted words and descriptions and could have been as long a series as the Stone Barrington series. So far Teddy Faye is a fascinating character and has far topped Stone Barrington although Stone does appear in almost every book thus far. By only making brief appearances I guess it gives Stone time to buy multi million dollar airplanes and plenty of time waiting for some random beautiful woman to ring his doorbell and want to go to bed him In the meantime Teddy can dodge the bullets…disarm all the bombs and kill all the bad guys that would like nothing more than to kill him. So far Teddy has proven to be a wonderful, believable hero. Hope this trend continues and there is as many books featuring Teddy as there are featuring Stone.

I registered a book at BookCrossing.com!
http://www.BookCrossing.com/journal/13410061

A private-eye molded on the old forms, Stanley Hastings makes cracks that, to me, get tiresome. He involves his friend, police sergeant MacAullif, in a blackmail case, and then runs rings around investigators of a murder, trying to keep MacAullif and himself out of it.

A little more specifically, Hastings is nearby when a dead man is discovered, because he has been following the woman who is trying to blackmail his client. He scrambles to keep his involvement and MacAullif's out of the picture, resorting to complicated schemes and tall tales.

It's old-style with a twist of humor, but didn't all the old guys use humor? The references to women are straight out of Sam Spade, with Hastings making the usual comments about their appearance that have become a bit offensive to many of us.

I think it tries too hard to be funny.

The Puzzle Lady cozy mysteries never disappoint. I love when Cora and Melvin get together. They are like oil and water where they don’t mix. I would have liked to see Sherry in the story a little more but I still loved the book. I loved the twists and I always get a great laugh when I read these stories. I look forward to reading the next book.

Presumed Puzzled (2015) (Puzzle Lady #17) by Parnell Hall. Seventeen murders in the small town of Bakerhaven and all have crossword puzzles deeply involved. Really? Perhaps it is time for the author to rethink his choice of clues or perhaps move onto his other series. It beggars belief that something like this could happen so often in such a small location. Then again, that is the problem with almost all amateur sleuth stories.
Anyway, Cora (The Puzzle Lady) and the Chief of Police trip on over to Pam Martingale’s house because her missing husband is supposed to be heading home. When they get there Pam is standing over her dead husband, bloody knife in hand.
Complications ensue, twists that stretch the bounds of believability, and soon it is Cora who is the leading suspect.
The puzzles that are included are great, in fact, for me they were the most interesting part of the book. But the story is too contrived for my taste, the plot twists beyond belief, and the thought that people would actually behave in this fashion is beyond my comprehension. But if you like this series, you’ll like this one also.

Liked this a lot in spite of it being pretty far from my usual sci-fi sweet spot. I picked it up off the new mystery shelf at the library (next to the new sci-fi) because it had “puzzles” in the title. Then got sucked in with sudoku in the first chapter and the overall premise of an old lady with a puzzle column in the newspaper who also happens to be the first person the police chief calls when he doesn’t know where to start with a murder mystery. I told myself I was reading to the end mostly to see if the puzzles themselves actually tied into the murder (only a bit, really, and not in a clever way), but if I’m honest I definitely was mostly reading because the old “puzzle lady” is written with a lot of wit and charm. (And it was a very fast read.)

Anyway, I enjoyed this, probably not enough to go find any of the other 13 novels in the series, but if I get a craving, it’s nice to know they exist.

A major subgenre of mystery fiction is the amateur detective, and within that is the amateur detective with some job that seems antithetical to being a master sleuth. In this case, it's a crossword puzzle editor, though the difference between an editor and constructor is not made clear in the novel. The mystery is OK but padded out. The characters are fine, if a bit exaggerated. The weakest point is the dialog. There are repeated passages of multi-page two-person dialog clearly meant to be repartee of the "His Girl Friday" sort, but they just annoying.

Your typical cozy mystery.

This is my first introduction to this series. Instantly, I connected with the characters. They were quirky. Just how I like my characters in cozy mysteries. This is the best art of these types of books. Cora is so sweet and someone that I would want to hang out with. Although, no offense as she may be known as the Puzzle Lady but she is not that great at solving crossword puzzles. The person that showed he had a real knack for solving puzzles is Harvey Beerbaum. I give credit to people who can solve crossword puzzles. I struggle at them. My forte are word searches.

Not to be forgotten is Chief Dale Harper. He did not showcase in my eyes that he is a strong leader but he is an alright guy. He does work well with others. When it counts the most, he does come through.

This book was made fun by the characters. The whodunit aspect was laid out and wrapped up I a nice package. Added bonus are the crossword puzzles inserted in this book. The puzzles actually help to solve the case. Which makes reading this book interactive.

3.5 Just pure fun , a series I go to whenever I need some bumbling humor. The Puzzle Lady, Cora Felton is a hoot, if she gets involved in a case, which she often does, anything goes. There are crossword puzzles as clues, even some soduko, and they can be the cause of much speculation. The witty dialogue and a woman, who can be compared to the deceiving clever, Columbo, just make these books so entertaining. The case is often secondary, but somehow, and I'm not sure how, they all get solved, come together in the end. The secondary characters even the police officers add greatly to the fun, all seem to fall under the cleverness of the Puzzle Lady. Though of course there is a story there too. No need to read from the beginning, though as always starting there adds insight to the characters and their relationships, but this one would be fun on it's own.

I also learned a new phrase I quite like, perennial millennials, quite clever.½

The Purloined Puzzle...A Puzzle Lady Mystery
By
Parnell Hall

What it's all about...

Cora is famous for creating these amazing crossword puzzles. The problem is that she doesn’t write them and she actually hates crossword puzzles. Her niece is the one who writes them. But no one really knows this...except...perhaps...for Cora’s ex husband. Cora has a rocky relationship with him. When he returns to Cora’s little town...he becomes a prime suspect for murder. This murder then becomes two murders. Cora seems to love this kind of puzzle and she gets overly involved in finding out what really happened and who really committed these murders.

This is the 19th Puzzle Lady book and my first Puzzle Lady book.

Why I wanted to read it...

Cora sounded as though she was a really unique character. The dialogue in this book was fast and clever. Cora was sarcastic and full of dry humor. I checked other Puzzle Lady books and Cora seemed to be a sort of elderly lady. Covers with her showed a white haired kind of sweetly chubby woman. However in this 19th book she seemed much younger. She was really active and dare I say seemed to be kind of interested in “getting busy”...especially with Melvin...accused murderer and ex husband. She denied any interest in him but there seemed to be an undercurrent of sexuality between the two of them.

What made me truly enjoy this book...

The plot and characters were fantastic in this book. It ranged from teenage Peggy Dawson and the first Puzzle to sex, drugs and rock and roll. I never was bored while reading this book. The banter among all characters was delightfully fun!

Why you should read it, too...

Readers who love a different kind of cozy mystery will really love this book. I think it can be read as a stand alone even though there are 18 books before it. I really want to read the earliest ones to see how Cora grew and changed.

I received an advance reader’s copy of this book from the publisher...St. Martin’s Press...through NetGalley and Amazon. It was my choice to read it and review it.

Very light reading. A fun read. My first read by this author.

Fun, easy read. I thought I had guessed who had obviously done it, but I was wrong.

Okay, I must confess I LOVE it when there are endings within other 'possible' endings. Sorry, but you gotta read the book to understand the above statement. No spoilers here.

An amusing diversion.
This is the first book by Hall which I have read. Nevertheless, it was obvious from the start that this was not the kind of mystery where the reader is challenged to solve it along with the detective. This book moves quickly to pack in more of Cora Felton's one-liners and witty obfuscations.
Includes 3 crossword puzzles & 4 sudokus and their solutions as part of the mystery.½

Miss Cora Felton is a seasoned and salty (hard-drinking, chain smoking) puzzle columnist turned amateur sleuth with her niece in the latest book from this modern, funny series.

Stanley Hastings, private detective, is living a dream. He is finally going to see his screenplay made into a movie. His name will be on the screen when the credits roll. He has made it! Or has he?

Starting with finding a dead body in the building the crew will use to shoot in, is just one of the downward steps this dream takes. Accidents, or are they accidents, more deaths and a steady stream of script rewrites he is constantly given are just more roadblocks to getting the movie in the can. It's enough trying to shoot around Manhattan without all these other distractions.

I've enjoyed Hall's Puzzle Lady mysteries and this doesn't let me down. I will keep an eye out for more of Stanley Hastings' doings