Search - Accessory to Murder (Josie Marcus, Mystery Shopper, Bk 3)

I have been a mystery shopper. I love this series. I love Josie Marcus. Elaine Viets writes a well edited and interesting series. You know Josie reminds me of Stephanie Plum but with better disquises.

Josie's best friend Alyce enjoys going undercover with Josie when she is mystery shopping. While on a shopping trip with Josie, Alyce, however, is less than thrilled to witness a robbery which confirms her theory that malls catering to the less than desirable parts of society will soon go out of business. To make matters worse, Alyce's neighbor Halley Hardwicke, a designer of thousand-dollar Italian silk scarves, is killed in the mall parking lot. Alyce's dismay over the death turns to horror when her husband Jake is arrested for arranging Halley's murder. Josie, of course, helps with the investigation to clear Jake of wrongdoing (even if she doesn't like him the least little bit!).

There are the normal side stories including "romance" for Josie courtesy of her mother's meddling and a backed up toilet. I found the method for trying to get Josie to back off her question asking to be quite entertaining, and to me, it was pretty ingenious even if it didn't work. This book is a fine read, and if you have invested in the series so far, you shouldn't be disappointed.

Someone has killed Halley Hardwicke, the hot young designer of thousand-dollar Italian silk scarves, in the mall parking lot-and police have their eye on Jake, the husband of Josie's best friend Alyce. The couple lived near the wrap maven, but it seems Halley and Jake were a little too neighborly.

So Josie decides to do what she does best to help out her friend-go undercover and see if she can find some clues. Because this time, there's a lot more at stake than a scarf, even if it's to die for...

I found this book to be a bit of a letdown. I LOVE Elaine Viets (especially her Dead End Jobs series), but this one just seemed to drag on. There were plenty of suspects and a pretty decent plot, but there seemed to be too many wasted pages (pages with parts that don't advance the plot and don't really need to be in there). I was rather disappointed.