Murder Can Mess Up Your Masterpiece
Artist Celeste Cabot welcomes the chance to show her paintings at a craft fair in her hometown of Gatlinburg, Tennessee, where she and her Chihuahua, Van Gogh, can park her vintage Shasta trailer and sell her creations, too.
Unfortunately, her sales take a hit when a customer returns a painting, claiming it’s haunted. When a fellow vendor discovers images hidden in Celeste’s artwork, and a ghost pays her a late-night visit, she’s shocked to realize she has psychic abilities. After the grumpy manager of the craft fair is found with a knife in his neck, Celeste’s brushes with the paranormal may help fill in the picture, and make sure the wrong person doesn’t get framed.
Series: A Haunted Craft Fair Mystery – Book 1
Author: Rose Pressey
Genre: Cozy Mystery/ Paranormal
Publisher: Kensington Books
Page Count: 304
Publishing Date: October 29, 2019
Rating: 
A new paranormal cozy series from author Rose Pressey, published by Kensington Books https://www.kensingtonbooks.com comes Murder Can Mess Up Your Masterpiece. This book is a marvelous creation of ghostly mystery.
Celeste is a fabulous character. Readers will like her from the beginning. Her family can be a bit much, but whose family isn’t? Everyone has those relatives that exude clumsiness but radiate love and good intentions. And this paranormal cozy has them in spades. The one thing all of Celeste’s family members have in common is their desire to help and protect her, even though she’s capable of doing both for herself. That’s what families are for, and she loves them and all of their quirks.
In this story, a man that no one likes is killed shortly after Celeste sets up her little pink trailer. She is also informed that without knowing it, Celeste has painted hidden figures in all of the paintings she is selling at the craft fair. The hidden figures take on an aspect of their own in the form of a ghost who steps out of one painting and hangs around. It seems like even the dead want to protect Celeste from harm. The ghost turns out to be a long-ago relative and has no idea why she is there except to help Celeste. Other characters, such as the two men that seem to be vying for Celeste’s attention, and the other vendors all have independent personalities that have room for growth if they continue in the series. As in most paranormal cozy books, the ghost will be a favorite character who hopefully will continue to make an appearance.
By the end of Murder Can Mess Up Your Masterpiece, the killer is unveiled, and the dead rest. The identity of the killer may not come as a surprise to readers, and there questions that are not answered. For instance, why did a couple of the vendors take a dislike to Celeste after treating her nicely at the beginning? Also, I am not a fan of love triangles in paranormal cozies, and unfortunately, this book leaves readers in the middle of one that is not resolved. I am sure it will be in future books, but for now, the outcome leaves readers hanging. Overall, I enjoyed this book, and I look forward to seeing where the series goes from here.
Other paranormal cozy books and series readers may want to check out include E. J. Copperman’s http://www.ejcopperman.com/ “A Haunted Guesthouse Mystery” https://www.thecozyreview.com/the-hostess-with-the-ghostess/ or Kate Young’s https://www.kateyoungbooks.com/ series “Marygene Brown Mysteries” https://www.thecozyreview.com/southern-sass-killer-cravings/.
About the Author:
Rose Pressey is a USA Today bestselling author. She enjoys writing quirky and fun novels with a paranormal twist. When she’s not writing about ghosts and other supernatural creatures, she loves eating cupcakes with sprinkles, reading, spending time with family, and listening to oldies from the fifties. Rose lives near Louisville, Kentucky, with her husband, son, and three sassy Chihuahuas.
Represented by Jill Marsal at the Marsal Lyon Literary Agency
Contact Rose: rose@rosepressey.com
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