Pleading the Fish
Café owner and amateur sleuth Everly Swan, like every Swan woman before her, is cursed in love. The only problem? Her fiancé Detective Grady Hayes has something to say about it; he doesn’t believe in magic and is determined to prove the curse wrong before their wedding so they can spend their lives together. Everly wishes it could be so simple!
It feels like a sign when a historian looking into the Swan family history is found dead in an antique wishing well, and Everly fears the curse is spreading. Grady takes the case, looking to find justice and prove the curse wrong, while Everly does a bit of investigating on her own.
Big change is coming for Everly and her friends, but with mysterious strangers lurking about and someone leaving increasingly threatening messages for the happy couple before their wedding day, Everly’s not sure she’ll get her happily ever after, but she just might have the family curse that will cost Grady his life!
The Details
Series: Seaside Café Mysteries – Book #7
Author: Bree Baker
Genre/Category: Cozy: Tea Shop/Wedding
Publisher: Poisoned Pen Press
ISBN: 172823865X
Page Count: 228
Rating: 
The Review
I strongly dislike it when one of my favorite series ends, but unfortunately, my dislike doesn’t change things. Pleading the Fish is the seventh and final book in the beloved “Seaside Café Mysteries” series. It is filled with wedding plans, a family curse, murder in a wishing well, friends, family, and love. In other words, everything a cozy mystery lover could want!
Everly is reluctantly planning her wedding. Even though she believes that her family has a curse that makes male loved ones die young, she has a ray of hope that the curse is fake and her marriage will not end prematurely. Grady, her fiancee, doesn’t believe in curses, and he sets out to prove it to Everly. Then a body shows up just when they need it least, and Everly and Grady set out to find a killer. Unfortunately, it doesn’t take long for them to become distracted by the investigation giving Everly something else to worry about. But most importantly, she fears her family curse may be the motive for the murder.
The characters in this series are always welcome guests. They have distinctive personalities and quarks that make them loveable and make readers want to call them family. The victim in this story is liked, and readers will feel awful when the character is found dead at the bottom of a wishing well just weeks before Everly’s wedding. Readers will wonder if the family curse has played a part in the death of what appears to be an innocent victim. But suspects soon come out of the woodwork, and readers are treated to plot twists, red herrings, and evidence that will set their teeth on edge. When the killer starts targeting Everly, family and friends will do whatever they can to keep her out of the line of fire and walk down the aisle on time. Curses don’t stand a chance when everyone gets involved in finding a murderer and helping Everly solve the case.
Pleading the Fish is the best book in this series, not just because it is the last one. Everything about the setting, characters, and premise keeps readers on the edge of their seats while smiling with delight. It’s a wedding no one thought would ever happen, and a family curse that makes all of us who have those weird events in our family history something to laugh about. I hope one day we will get a follow-up book or story to let us know how Everly and Grady spend their lives, update us on their (hopefully) children, and show us how happy a couple can be once they find the right one to trust and spend their lives with
Warning: The ending of this book may make readers cry. I did!
The Author
Julie Anne Lindsey (aka Bree Baker, Jacqueline Frost, Julie Chase) is an award-winning and bestselling author of mystery and romantic suspense. She’s published more than thirty novels since her debut in 2013 and currently writes series as herself, as well as under other pen names, Bree Baker and Julie Chase. When Julie’s not creating new worlds or fostering the epic love of fictional characters, she can be found in Kent, Ohio, enjoying her blessed Midwestern life. And probably plotting murder with her shamelessly enabling friends. Today she hopes to make someone smile. One day she plans to change the world. Julie is a member of the International Thriller Writers, Sisters in Crime, and Romance Writers of America.
Other books in the “Seaside Café Mysteries” series readers will want to pick up are No Good Tea Goes Unpunished or the delightful Tide and Punishment.
Represented by: Marsal Lyon Literary Agency
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