8. Candle Island by Lauren Wolk

listened on Audible

352 pgs. (9:24)

2025
Middle Grades HF (almost CRF)
Finished 2/7/2026
Goodreads rating: 4.31
My rating: 5
Setting: Island off the coast of Maine, approaching DownEast

My comments: I'm so glad I read this.  No cell phones, no computers, the encyclopedia at the library dates from 1902. In my head it was the 70s.  Many facets of the story....losing your dad, moving with your mom from Vermont to a Maine island - an island only accessible by ferry - saving an osprey baby and raising it, Townies vs Summer kids, making friends, fishing and horse riding, learning to sail and exploring.  And painting. So good.

Goodreads synopsis:  A moving portrait of loss and the restorative power of art from Lauren Wolk, the Newbery Honor-winning author of Beyond the Bright Sea.

Lucretia Sanderson has a secret.

Lucretia and her mother have come to tiny Candle Island, Maine ( Summer, 986; Winter, 315) to escape—escape memories of the car accident that killed her father and escape the journalists that hound her mother, a famous and reclusive artist. The rocky coast and ocean breeze are a welcome respite for Lucretia, who dedicates her summer days to painting, exploring the island, and caring for an orphaned osprey chick.

But Candle Island has secrets of its own—a hidden room in her new house, a mysterious boy with a beautiful voice—and just like the strong tides that surround the shores, they will catch Lucretia in their wake.

With an unforgettable New England setting and a complex web of relationships old and new, Candle Island is a powerful story about art, loss, and the power of being true to your own voice.

47. The Bookstore Family by Alice Hoffman - a short story

listened on Audible

42 pgs.

copyright
Adult contemporary fiction
Finished 10/28
Goodreads rating: 4.22
My rating: 3.5
Setting: Paris and an island off the coast of Maine, contemporary

My comments:   Depressing short story about a young woman who has spent five years in France since leaving the small Maine island that she grew up on and loved until she returns home because her mother is dying.

Goodreads synopsis:  New York Times bestselling author Alice Hoffman takes her sweet bookshop series to Paris with an emotional short story about chasing your dreams—and finding your passion where you least expect it.

Growing up, Violet was so busy helping others realize their dreams, she found little time to pursue her own. But five years ago, she took the chance of a lifetime, leaving the family bookshop on Brinkley’s Island, Maine, to attend culinary school in Paris. Now she’s working her dream job as a pâtissiere in an upscale Parisian restaurant—yet all she can think about is home.

Feeling unmoored, Violet finds herself still searching for something…Connection? Maybe. She hasn’t made any real friends in the city. Inspiration? Possibly. Her desserts are lovely, but they’re definitely lacking something.

After her aunt Isabel urges her to keep on looking, Violet finally gets a taste of what she’s been missing in the café at the Museum of Romantic Life. But just as life begins to come into focus, she’s abruptly called home to Maine. Like her aunt before her, Violet soon learns that family could hold the key to discovering what she truly needs.

23. The Summer Guests by Tess Gerritson

#2 The Martini Club, Maine

listened on Audible

363 pgs.

2025
Adult mystery
Finished 5/14/2025
Goodreads rating:  4.30
My rating: 3.5
Setting: contemporary Purity, Maine, on the shore of a lake in a small tourist town on the ocean.

My comments: Susan and her daughter have come to her wealthy new i-laws "cabin" to spread the ashes of her deceased father-in-law.  When her daughter goes missing, the female police chief, Joe, as well as "the martini club", a group of retired CIOA operatives, get to work on the case.  Pretty slow-moving story, and quite difficult to like any of the characters!  Note: The town cop, Jo, seems to be somewhat of an idiot.

Goodreads synopsis:  When former spy Maggie Bird retired to the seaside hamlet of Purity, Maine, she settled in for a quiet life with breathtaking views. But enemies from her past soon threatened to destroy everything.

Maggie survived, thanks to her wits and the collective intelligence of the Martini Club, the circle of ex-CIA friends in her cocktail-sipping book club. Their handiwork, however, caught the attention of young police chief Jo Thibodeau. Now Jo and her neighborhood ex-spies have an uneasy alliance.

After a teenager vanishes—and Maggie’s neighbor becomes the prime suspect—she joins the investigation, determined to prove her friend’s innocence. But the girl’s wealthy family pushes for an arrest. And when authorities discover a long-dead corpse in a nearby pond, the case becomes doubly complicated, with unthinkable ties to long-buried secrets.

As Jo grapples with two unexplained mysteries, the Martini Club races to uncover the truth behind shadowy secrets…before more lives are lost.

77. The Cliffs by J. Courtney Sullivan

listened on Libby

384 pgs.

2024
Adult Mystery
Finished 11/1/2024
Goodreads rating: 3.60
My rating: 4.25 
Setting: southern Maine coast community

My comments:   Ending seemed incomplete.  Loved all the historical facts that some readers considered "preachy." Took place in southern Maine with lots of social/feminist thinking.

Goodreads synopsis:  A novel of family, secrets, ghosts, and homecoming set on the seaside cliffs of Maine, by the New York Times best-selling author of Friends and Strangers.

On a secluded bluff overlooking the ocean sits a Victorian house, lavender with gingerbread trim, a home that contains a century’s worth of secrets. By the time Jane Flanagan discovers the house as a teenager, it has long been abandoned. The place is an irresistible mystery to Jane. There are still clothes in the closets, marbles rolling across the floors, and dishes in the cupboards, even though no one has set foot there in decades. The house becomes a hideaway for Jane, a place to escape her volatile mother.

Twenty years later, now a Harvard archivist, she returns home to Maine following a terrible mistake that threatens both her career and her marriage. Jane is horrified to find the Victorian is now barely recognizable. The new owner, Genevieve, a summer person from Beacon Hill, has gutted it, transforming the house into a glossy white monstrosity straight out of a shelter magazine. Strangely, Genevieve is convinced that the house is haunted—perhaps the product of something troubling Genevieve herself has done. She hires Jane to research the history of the place and the women who lived there. The story Jane uncovers—of lovers lost at sea, romantic longing, shattering loss, artistic awakening, historical artifacts stolen and sold, and the long shadow of colonialism—is even older than Maine itself.

Enthralling, richly imagined, filled with psychic mediums and charlatans, spirits and past lives, mothers, marriage, and the legacy of alcoholism, this is a deeply moving novel about the land we inhabit, the women who came before us, and the ways in which none of us will ever truly leave this earth.

62. Clammed Up by Barbara Ross

#1 A Maine Clambake Mystery

listened on Audible

378 pgs.

2013
Adult cozy mystery
Finished 7-9-2024
Goodreads rating: 3.92
My rating: 3.75
Setting: contemporary Maine coast

My comments: I don't usually go for so-called "cozy mysteries", but I liked the cover of this one.  Maybe I just miss a good lobster dinner, but I thought I'd try just for the heck of it.  It really wasn't too bad.  I wasn't especially fond of the narrator....I think if I read it myself I would have given the protagonist a totally different demeanor.  Her voice sounded younger than 30 years old, more excitable, and even made her sound a little bit more know-it-all than I imagined her.  Pretty decent mystery with a lot of local color, set in a small community just a 10-minute or so drive from Bath.

Goodreads synopsis:  Julia Snowden returned to her hometown of Busman’s Harbor, Maine to rescue her family’s struggling clambake business—not to solve crimes. But that was before a catered wedding on picturesque Morrow Island turned into a reception for murder. When the best man’s corpse is found hanging from the grand staircase in the Snowden family mansion, Julia must put the chowder pot on the back burner and join the search for the killer. And with suspicion falling on her old crush, Chris Durand, the recipe for saving her business and salvaging her love life might be one and the same.

60. Pitch Dark by Paul Doiron

#15 Mike Bowditch, Maine Game Warden

listened on Audible

304 pgs.

2024
Adult series murder mystery
Finished 7/4/2024
Goodreads rating: 4.28
My rating: 4
Setting: Contemporary Maine woods, Jackman and US/Canada border.

My comments: This book was a bit different than his previous books which had Mike Bowditch out and about doing his investigating in different parts of Maine.  In this one he and his father-in-law are out in the woods tracking a bad guy and his young daughter.  A bit of adventure, some survival skills, pondering clues, and near-catastrophes and very close calls make this an interesting adventure.

Goodreads synopsis:  Legendary bush pilot Josie Jonson can’t believe her luck when a skilled builder just happens to show up after she purchases land near Prentiss Pond. All Mark Redmond asks in return for building Josie’s dream cabin is that he be left alone to homeschool his 12-year-old daughter, Cady.

For Maine game warden investigator Mike Bowditch, the intensity of Redmond's secretiveness is troubling, especially in light of suspicious criminal activity being reported around the area―including rumors of an armed man offering large sums of money in exchange for the location of Redmond and Cady. Josie, though hesitant to violate the trust of her prized builder, eventually agrees to fly Mike and his father-in-law Charley Stevens to the secluded pond in an attempt to protect Redmond and Cady. But hours after landing, the trip takes a dark turn when they witness a horrific murder and are taken captive themselves.

Freeing himself, Mike is forced to set off through the impenetrable Maine forest towards Canada, alone and unarmed in pursuit of a mysterious fugitive. As he navigates a windblown landscape choked with deadfalls and blocked by swollen streams, he marvels at his enemy’s bush craft. The killer possesses skills surpassing his own, and Bowditch can't tell if he is the cat or the mouse in this dangerous game. Can Mike Bowditch stop his adversary in time to save the life of a young girl, or will he be forced to watch another innocent soul die?

59. The Berry Pickers by Amanda Peters

listened on Audible

307 pgs.

2023
Adult Mystery
Finished 6/26/24
Goodreads rating: 4.13
My rating: 4
Setting: Rural Maine (Rt. 9 north of Bangor) and Nova Scotia

My comments: Two voices, 1960 and perhaps 2000?  A four-year-old Micmac girl is kidnapped by a woman who has had many miscarriages and of course is slightly off.  The family of the little girl, Ruthie, (both parents, two brothers and a sister) never get over the feeling that she is still alive.  She is raised by the kidnapper and her husband as their own child, the mother being an odd woman who's super afraid that something is going to happen to now-Norma.  The story keeps switching back-and-forth between Ruthie/Norma and Joe, her two year older brother, who blames himself for her disappearance and has had an unhappy life because of the guilt he feels.  He's a good person, they are a good family, but it takes them almost five decades to reunite.  Such a sad story, but a really good one, too...

Goodreads synopsis:  A four-year-old Mi’kmaq girl goes missing from the blueberry fields of Maine, sparking a tragic mystery that haunts the survivors, unravels a community, and remains unsolved for nearly fifty years.

July 1962. A Mi’kmaq family from Nova Scotia arrives in Maine to pick blueberries for the summer. Weeks later, four-year-old Ruthie, the family’s youngest child, vanishes. She is last seen by her six-year-old brother, Joe, sitting on a favorite rock at the edge of a berry field. Joe will remain distraught by his sister’s disappearance for years to come.

In Maine, a young girl named Norma grows up as the only child of an affluent family. Her father is emotionally distant, her mother frustratingly overprotective. Norma is often troubled by recurring dreams and visions that seem more like memories than imagination. As she grows older, Norma slowly comes to realize there is something her parents aren’t telling her. Unwilling to abandon her intuition, she will spend decades trying to uncover this family secret.  

54. Beyond Reach by Molly Black

#2 Reese Link, Maine cop

listened on Chirp
198 pgs.

2023
Genre/Level
Finished 6/11/24
Goodreads rating: 4.13
My rating: 3
Setting: Contemporary Maine coast

My comments: This was supposed to be set inn Maine, but it could have been set anywhere.  It kept my attention but wasn't overwhelming "good."  

Goodreads synopsis:  Small town police officer Reese Link, teaming up with her new Maine State Police partner, is assigned another explosive the second warden in the state has turned up murdered. These seem like vengeance killings, but Reese suspects something much darker, more maniacal, and she knows it will take all she has to enter this killer’s mind and outwit him before he strikes again.

Reese Link is determined to do right by her deceased older brother, to fill his shoes in the local police department, and to avenge his murder. She also wants to make her father, a local lobsterman, proud. But the local force is male, and close-knight, and Reese soon learns that being accepted won’t be so easy.

Small town life on a harbor in Maine can be rough. Winters can be cruel and stretch forever, while the working class who inhabit the harbor suffer no fools. Reese knows this town like the back of her hand—but when she teams up with a State police officer, she quickly realizes she’ll have to branch out to other areas, way out of her comfort zone. She will have to learn quickly about all regions of Maine, as she hunts deadly killers wherever they may take her.

All along, she must fight her own demons, shake off the heaviness of her childhood, the depression of this town, and ask is she good enough?

48. How to Read a Book by Monica Wood

listened on Audible
288 pgs.

2024
Adult Contemporary Fiction
Finished 5/27/24
Goodreads rating: 4.36
My rating: 5
Setting: Contemporary Maine, Portland area

My comments:  I couldn't put this one down.  Told from the points of view of three different characters and set in Maine - with many references to locations that I totally knew - this beautifully written novel has won my heart!  The narrator was fantastic.  The kindness, integrity, and humility of Violet Harriet, and Frank were the very heart of this poignant story.

Goodreads synopsis:  A charming, deeply moving novel about second chances, unlikely friendships, and the life-changing power of sharing stories.

Our Reasons meet us in the morning and whisper to us at night. Mine is an innocent, unsuspecting, eternally sixty-one-year-old woman named Lorraine Daigle…

Violet Powell, a twenty-two-year-old from rural Abbott Falls, Maine, is being released from prison after serving twenty-two months for a drunk-driving crash that killed a local kindergarten teacher. Harriet Larson, a retired English teacher who runs the prison book club, is facing the unsettling prospect of an empty nest. Frank Daigle, a retired machinist, hasn’t yet come to grips with the complications of his marriage to the woman Violet killed.

When the three encounter each other one morning in a bookstore in Portland—Violet to buy the novel she was reading in the prison book club before her release, Harriet to choose the next title for the women who remain, and Frank to dispatch his duties as the store handyman—their lives begin to intersect in transformative ways.

How to Read a Book  is an unsparingly honest and profoundly hopeful story about letting go of guilt, seizing second chances, and the power of books to change our lives. With the heart, wit, grace, and depth of understanding that has characterized her work, Monica Wood illuminates the decisions that define a life and the kindnesses that make life worth living.  . 

44. Beyond Reason by Molly Black

#1 Reese Link/ Maine police officer

read on Kindle
201 pgs.

2023
Adult Mystery
Finished 6/17/2023
Goodreads rating: 4.12
My rating: 3
Setting: contemporary Maine

My comments: A brand new rookie police officer in a coastal Maine town gets assigned her first case - a homicide - and is paired up with a young but seasoned state police officer.  Very unbelievable, as are all the stunts and judgment calls that she makes.  Perhaps if she was more seasoned I would believe more, but I kept shaking my head.

41. Happy Place by Emily Henry

400  pgs.

2023
Adult romcom
Finished 5/30/23
Goodreads rating: 4.02
My rating: 3
Setting: contemporary cottage on the coast of Maine

My comments: Three best friends since college.  One last week together in a snazzy summer cottage on the coast of Maine.  Being forced together after a five-month break up after eight years together with the love of her life.  It was just too much.  "I love you forever"...."I'll do whatever is the best for you"...."should we finally talks about it since we never have".....that kind of ridiculousness.  It got old fast.  Narrator Julia Whelan is always wonderful to listen to, she does such a great job with voice.  But the story - sappy and sentimental with  (of course) an HEA...been there, done that, no more please.

Goodreads synopsis:  Harriet and Wyn have been the perfect couple since they met in college—they go together like salt and pepper, honey and tea, lobster and rolls. Except, now—for reasons they’re still not discussing—they don’t.

They broke up six months ago. And still haven’t told their best friends.

Which is how they find themselves sharing the largest bedroom at the Maine cottage that has been their friend group’s yearly getaway for the last decade. Their annual respite from the world, where for one vibrant, blue week they leave behind their daily lives; have copious amounts of cheese, wine, and seafood; and soak up the salty coastal air with the people who understand them most.

Only this year, Harriet and Wyn are lying through their teeth while trying not to notice how desperately they still want each other. Because the cottage is for sale and this is the last week they’ll all have together in this place. They can’t stand to break their friends’ hearts, and so they’ll play their parts. Harriet will be the driven surgical resident who never starts a fight, and Wyn will be the laid-back charmer who never lets the cracks show. It’s a flawless plan (if you look at it from a great distance and through a pair of sunscreen-smeared sunglasses). After years of being in love, how hard can it be to fake it for one week… in front of those who know you best?

A couple who broke up months ago make a pact to pretend to still be together for their annual weeklong vacation with their best friends in this glittering and wise new novel from #1 New York Times bestselling author Emily Henry.

Neighbor by Jack Merrill (for Ashley Bryan)

Neighbor

my friend is a gardener

my friend is a painter

my friend is a poet

my friend plays music

my friend

is magical

his voice is the voice of all the winds

the hot wind, the cold wind

the wind that blows through the trees

the wind that blows over the ocean

the wind that blows down city streets

the wind that blows golden fall leaves

and green spring grass

the wind that carries stories

that predicts the future and reveals the past

my friend's voice is the voice of animals

frog and hare, goat and crow, rooster and spider

he has the voice of children

and the voices of their fathers

and the voice of their grandmothers

yes, his is a big voice

that calls out proudly to the world

and yes, he is proud to be who he is

my friend

just so!

       Jack Merrill

My note:  I found this on Facebook today, posted by the Ashley Bryan Center

Jack's note:  "just so" is a Caribbean expression that roughly means "that's just the way it is"

Facebook note:  Jack and Erica Merrilll and their two kids were Ashley's neighbor and friend for over 40 years.

My note:  The Merrill family is a wonderful family....I taught both the kids and Erica was my friend and colleague at MDES for many years.  Jack is/was a lobster fisherman and one of the nicest people I've known.  They were "from" Islesford, but lived in NEH during the school year so the kids could attend MDES.

69. The Bookstore Sisters - a short story by Alice Hoffman,

read & listened on Kindle Unlimited/Audible

2022
36 pgs.
Adult CRF
Finished  11/23/2022
Goodreads rating: 4.18
My rating: 4
Setting: Contemporary small island off the Maine coast

My comments: A sweet story that takes place on a small island on the Maine coast.  Two sisters who haven't spoken in over a decade reconcile...slowly....  When their mother died, the youngest, Isabel, totally retreated into herself and left eh older sister, Sophie, to deal with everything on her own.  This included the tiny bookstore that their dad ran after their mom's death.  When Isabel does finally return to the island, she faces her past history and wakes up for the first time since she was 12.

Goodreads synopsis:  From New York Times bestselling author Alice Hoffman comes a heartfelt short story about family, independence, and finding your place in the world.
Isabel Gibson has all but perfected the art of forgetting. She’s a New Yorker now, with nothing left to tie her to Brinkley’s Island, Maine. Her parents are gone, the family bookstore is all but bankrupt, and her sister, Sophie, will probably never speak to her again.

But when a mysterious letter arrives in her mailbox, Isabel feels herself drawn to the past. After years of fighting for her independence, she dreads the thought of going back to the island. What she finds there may forever alter her path—and change everything she thought she knew about her family, her home, and herself.

Poetry Book: Maine: The Way Life Should Be: A Wicked Good Book of Verse by Robert Pottle

Illustrated by Holly Hardwick
paperback
found at Ellsworth Library

2005, Blue Lobster Press, Eastbrook, Maine

64 pgs.

wonderful "pencil" drawings

Goodreads rating:   3.67 - 3 ratings

My rating:  5/Loved it! 

My comments:  The poetr, Robert Pottle, was born in Eastport and now lives in Eastbrook (or at least he did when this book was published.)

Loved the poems and line drawings.  There's also information on each page.  Many are song to familiar tunes:

    "There's  a Racoon in the Trash Can" (Battle Humn of the Republic)

    "Have You Ever Seen a Puffin?" (The More We Get Together)

    "I'm a Little Lobster " Part I - catching; Part II - cooking; Part III - eating

    "Itsy Bitsy Black Flies" (Itsy Bitsy Spider, of course!)

    "Nine Painted Turtles " (One little, two little, three little ...)

    "Busy Beaver's Song" (I've Been Working on the Railroad)

Loons
 Whether hauntingly howling one night on a lake
or laughing one morning in June,
they’re known for the numerous sounds they can make;
a primitive bird is the loon.
 
The common loon’s plumage is all black and whte,
The newborns are brownish and black.
If you’re lucky you may see a marvelous sight;
a loon with a chick on its back.
 
At diving and swimming, they cannot be beat.
At aquatics, they’re simply the best,
but it takes them an hour of flapping their feet
to get from the short to their nest.

Goodreads:  Funny poems, and songs set to familiar tunes, about Maine's abundant wildlife. Interesting animal facts about all of the animals covered are included.

75. The Caretaker, a short story/novella by Paul Doiron

#11.5 Mike Bowditch

read on Kindle

2021
51pgs.
Adult mystery
Finished  7/7/2021
Goodreads rating: 4.09 - 241 ratings
My rating: 4
Setting: Contemporary Maine BOONIES

First line/s: "I was seated on the porch of my old friend Charley Stevens, the two of us enjoying the quiet calm of Sixth Machias Lake and the flutter of southbound warblers in the pines overhead, when we heard a car approaching down the dirt track that led to his house deep in the Maine woods."

My comments: Definitely contemporary, not set in the past like some of the short stories about Charlie Stevens.  Interesting.  Enjoyed it.

Goodreads synopsis:   In this new original short story from bestselling author Paul Doiron, Maine Game Warden Mike Bowditch tracks down a sinister prowler turning a couple's dream vacation home into a nightmare.
        New owners of a dream cottage on a remote Maine lake find themselves taunted, then menaced by an unknown figure. When the local authorities refuse to help, they turn to retired Maine game warden Charley Stevens and his young protege Mike Bowditch for protection. But Charley begins to suspect there is more to the mystery than the couple is letting on--and if he and Mike don’t act fast, the situation will explode into violence.

24. Backtrack by Paul Doiron

#9.5 Mike Bowditch

read on Kindle 

2019
21 pgs.
Adult short story - mystery
Finished 3/19/2021
Goodreads rating: 4.02 - 273 ratings
My rating: 3
Setting: Maine woods, perhaps 1980

First line/s: "There were four doctors staying at the hunting camp."

My comments: Depressing, very short story about a doctor who has decided to end his cancer-ridden life by freezing to death in the woods instead of going through the ups and mostly downs of end-of-life in a sickbed and Charlie takes on finding him when he disappears.  He was only 28 when this happened, and he's reflecting on it as an older gentleman.

Goodreads synopsis:  When a visiting hunter goes missing in the middle of a snowstorm, a young Charley Stevens (later the mentor to game warden Mike Bowditch) sets off to rescue him—but begins to suspect the man may not want to be found.

6. Black Rock Bay by Brianna Labuskes

listened on Audible - also have Kindle
narrated by Sarah Naughton
Unabridged audio (11:18)
2019
364 pgs.
Contemporary Mystery
Finished 1/30/21
Goodreads rating: 4.03 - 1736 ratings
My rating: 3
Setting: St. Lucy's, Maine - an island off the coast of Rockland, winter

First line/s: "Then.  The whimper was a quiet thing, broken and almost lost to the wind battering the outside of the lighthouse."

What I posted on Goodreads:  Chose because of the Maine setting.  The mystery was okay.  Characterization only so-so.

My comments: Always drawn to novels that take place in Maine, this enticed me because it was also a murder mystery.  I think it could've been a good one, but there were so many different scenarios offered by the two cops that it bacame confusing.  And repetitive, which seems to be something that really bugs me.  I never felt I knew any of the characters at all so I wasn't even sure of motivations.  I did get a sense of Asher, but not of Cash, definitely not of Mia's mother, an what I did get was mostly told and not show.  Great concept for a book but didn't ssem to fulfill its vas opportunities.

Goodreads synopsis:  A detective returns to her haunted past, with deadly consequences, in an icy novel of psychological suspense by the Washington Post and Amazon Charts bestselling author of Girls of Glass.      
      Detective Mia Hart never planned to return home. One terrifying summer night, Mia lost two of her closest friends to suicide. Scarred and broken, she fled St. Lucy’s, a small island off the coast of Maine.
Now fifteen years later, when the body of a journalist is fished out of the bay near St. Lucy’s cliffs, Mia is forced to help with the case—and face all she’s been running from. As she approaches the island, the wintery winds of Black Rock Bay usher Mia home again.
          When Mia digs into the reporter’s death, she finds he left behind a written clue: It wasn't suicide. Mia soon discovers it’s her own tragic past he was referring to. Now, as she tries to untangle a web of lies, Mia realizes that solving this case means becoming the next pawn in someone’s blood-chilling game of truth or die.

156. Twelve Slays of Christmas by Jacqueline Frost

#1 Christmas Tree Farm mystery

listened on Audible - free

narrated by Allyson Ryan

Unabridged audio (8:16)
2017

311 pgs.
Adult Cozy Mystery
Finished 12/22/2020
Goodreads rating: 4.02 - 2253 ratings
My rating: 2 (Just not a cozy mystery fan)
Setting: Contemporary small town Maine 

First line/s:   " 'I have two cups of Santa's cinnamon tea, one spicy apple cider, and a peppermint twist hot cocoa,' I said, setting the mugs on the table surrounded by rosy-cheeked women wearing matching holiday sweaters."

My comments: Deceiving title, only one murder.  There's a reason I don't read cozy mysteries. Only ready this because it's set in Maine. This was so sugary sweet, silly, and stupid.  Stereotypical everything, a Hallmark movie extraordinaire in print.  How can a whole town's worth of people fit in one living room a dozen times?  Ridiculous!

Goodreads synopsis:  When Holly White's fiance cancels their Christmas Eve wedding with less than two weeks to go, Holly heads home with a broken heart. Lucky for her, home in historic Mistletoe, Maine is magical during Christmastime--exactly what the doctor prescribed. Except her plan to drown her troubles in peppermints and snickerdoodles is upended when local grouch and president of the Mistletoe Historical Society Margaret Fenwick is bludgeoned and left in the sleigh display at Reindeer Games, Holly's family tree farm.

          When the murder weapon is revealed as one of the wooden stakes used to identify trees on the farm, Sheriff Evan Grey turns to Holly's father, Bud, and the Reindeer Games staff. And it doesn't help that Bud and the reindeer keeper were each seen arguing with Margaret just before her death. But Holly knows her father, and is determined to exonerate him.The jingle bells are ringing, the clock is ticking, and if Holly doesn't watch out, she'll end up on Santa's naughty list in Twelve Slays of Christmas, Jacqueline Frost's jolly series debut. 

95. One Last Lie by Paul Doiron

#11 Mike Bowditch, Maine Game Warden

listened on Audible
narrated by Henry Leyva
Unabridged audio (9:33) 
2020 Minotaur Books
310 pgs.
Adult Murder Mystery/Police Procedural
Finished 7/19/2020
Goodreads rating: 4.18 - 1139 ratings
My rating: 3.5
Setting: Fort Kent area, Maine

First line/s: "Before I left for Florida my old friend and mentor Charley Stevens gave me a puzzling piece of advice." 

My comments: Charley Stevens has disappeared, on his own, and Mike Bowditch is out hunting for him, following the breadcrumbs that he has left as a trail.  The story is a bit convoluted and involves a lot of people, and it seems to get a little bit disjointed at times.  Perhaps because it didn't hold my interest as much as the Bowditch stories usually do.  And I think he's going to get back with Stacy Stevens, I don't know what the attractions is with her, but his current girlfriend, Danny, doesn't want kids and he really does so that's probably the direction that Doiron want to take him.  He's 31 now, and ready to settle down, I think.  Well, it'll be another year before we discover the next episode.  I wish I'd liked this one a little bit better than I did.

Goodreads synopsis:  A sudden disappearance reveals a startling connection to a 15-year-old cold case in the new thriller from bestselling Edgar Award finalist Paul Doiron.

          “Never trust a man without secrets.” These are the last words retired game warden Charley Stevens speaks to his surrogate son, Warden Investigator Mike Bowditch, before the old man vanishes without explanation into a thousand miles of forest along the Canadian border. Mike suspects his friend’s sudden disappearance has to do with an antique badge found at a flea market — a badge that belonged to a warden who was presumed dead fifteen years ago but whose body was never recovered. On a mission to find Charley before he meets a similarly dark fate, Mike must reopen a cold case that powerful people, including his fellow wardens — one of whom might be a killer — will do anything to keep closed.

85. The Imposter by Paul Doiron

#10.5 Mike Bowditch, Maine Game Warden
listened on Audible
narrated by Henry Leyva
Unabridged audio (1:29)
2020, Minotaur Bks
60 pgs.
Adult Mystery
Finished 5/25/2020
Goodreads rating:  3.93 - 192 ratings
My rating: 4
Setting: contemporary Washington County, Maine

First line/s:  "Twelve-gauge Gaynor had been rowing his skiff from the town landing out to his lobster boat, the Dragon Lady, when he'd spotted a metallic glimmer coming through the blue-green water."

My comments: A very short story, which does not take place after book number 10, but way back, nearer to the beginning of the series.  It takes place in Washington County when Mike as a young game warden.  Short but sweet with a very abrupt ending - we never find out why the imposter took on Mike Bowditch's identity.  Oh well.

Goodreads synopsis:  In this original short story in the bestselling Mike Bowditch mystery series by Paul Doiron, Mike is confronted with a case of stolen identity.
          When the body of a young man is pulled from a submerged car in Roque Harbor, rookie game warden Mike Bowditch is shocked when the man’s driver’s license identifies him as none other than…Mike Bowditch. For weeks, Mike and his colleagues have been fielding reports of a man terrorizing the locals while posing as a game warden, wielding a plastic pin-on badge and claiming to be “Warden Bowditch”. Who is the imposter, and how did he end up dead in the bottom of a harbor? Mike must uncover the truth in order to clear his own name.