REVIEW: A Christmas Peril

A Christmas Peril
Author: J.A. Hennrikus

Edwina Sullivan, called "Sully'' by her friends, has retired from law enforcement to be the general manager of the Cliffside Theater Company. Most of the time she just deals with the budget, backstage problems, and difficult actors, but this holiday season her worries become a bit more serious. Her best friend Eric is accused of murdering his father. Peter Whitehall was a very important man in town before he was shot to death. So now she is juggling the budget for A Christmas Carol, dealing with a Scrooge with a drinking problem, and investigating a murder.....  It's going to be a perilous Christmas.

This is a promising start to the new A Theater Cop Mystery series. I like Sully as a main character. She has rebuilt her life following the end of her cop career and her marriage. Her love life certainly is complicated. Her ex-husband becomes a suspect during the investigation and all through the book he kept trying to talk to her about something....but never managed it. Then she has other love interests. The ending leaves it all up in the air....maybe the second book will see some things fall into line along those lines. But.....I wasn't reading the book to follow Sully's love life (past or present). The mystery is engaging and nicely paced. I liked the characters and the setting. And, the ending actually caught me by surprise. Nice! I liked it enough to read more books in this series.

I had hoped that the story would be a bit more holiday themed....but it was long on mystery with hints of Christmas, Scrooge and romance. Nice mix, even though I was hoping for a bit more Christmas theme. All in all, a nice read. I look forward to seeing how this new series develops!

J.A. Hennrikus also writes under the name Julianne Holmes (Clock Shop Mysteries). To find out more about the author, check out her website: https://jahennrikus.com/2017/09/10/found-in-the-wild/

**I voluntarily read an advanced readers copy of this book from Midnight Ink via NetGalley. Opinions expressed are entirely my own.**