Scrabbling for the Culprit   

The Board Game Murders, Book #1

By Jane Wallace   

ASIN: B083MBNS21   

Brought to you by OBS reviewer Andra                   

Summary:

Adult triplets Cassie, Callie and Lonnie Parker, have thrown their hearts and souls into planning the Scrabble tournament Callie is hosting at the local high school. But, when a bookcase full of dictionaries lands on a beloved teacher, murmurs of foul play threaten the entire competition. With the new-to-the-county detective, who doesn’t know the townspeople yet and a school full of suspects, can these siblings work together to find the killer, keep everyone else safe, and move all the pieces into place to run spectacular tournament? (Goodreads)

Review:

Scrabbling for the Culprit if the first book in The Board Game Murders series by Jane Wallace. In fact, it is the first book I have read by this author. It was a quick cozy mystery read. A nice surprise in that this book had no murder – just an accident. 

I found the triplets entertaining. The list of culprits was addressed methodically and in short order, I knew instinctively whodunit even with the repeated claims that they were innocent.

I enjoyed the fact that the siblings were trust fund babies with a stipulation regarding receipt of their funds – they must hold down jobs and perform a certain number of volunteer hours each month. The other premise, that of a scrabble tournament being sponsored by the youngest triplet, Callie and her vintage board game shop also garnered my attention. I have always liked board games so was intrigued as to how this would play out (pun intended).

I must say one of the things which led me to give it a rating of 2 was that the editorial review did not catch numerous errors. And frankly, that annoys me to know end – a few examples (and unfortunately, there are plenty more):

• “I don’t what to expect.”  – Seems like a word is missing between ‘don’t’ and ‘what’?
• “It feels more like a generation gap thing that anything personal.” – Maybe ‘that’ should be ‘than’?
• “Jeff has a good friend for most of our lives,” – Again, possibly the word been is missing between “has” and “a”.

Also, whoever created the summary of the book indicates that the triplets were looking for the killer in the hopes of keeping others safe. Yet the victim did not die? Oh well.  These sorts of missteps lead me to think whether I shall give this series a further look. While I liked the premise and story-line, I am not convinced I will give this series further consideration. Really a shame since there is such potential.