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Dead on Arrival — Katie Gray
“A very well written crime fiction story.”
An enjoyable cosy crime novel. This is the first book in The Dead Series. Pippsy and Jack Standage are private investigators who visit a luxurious Cotswold hotel for a restful break.Alas it proves to be anything but restful.
Classification: Crime and mystery fiction
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Rating 1 (from 3 votes)
Rating: 5.00 out of 5 (3 customer ratings)
Reviews
CARMEL
A Great Read
A dead man in the driving seat? Pippsy and Jack Standage couldn’t resist getting involved in the case. The interesting and amusing way they went about solving the mystery made very enjoyable reading.
I was intrigued from the start and made time to put my feet up and read it over three nights. It is an ideal book to relax with on a cold winter night by the fire. It is action packed. The twists and turns in the story kept me totally adsorbed and guessing what the final outcome would be.
This is a great debut novel. Katie Gray has a brilliant imagination. It’s a very well written crime fiction story. I sincerely hope to read more of Pippsy and Jack’s adventures in the near future.
Verified Purchase
Nick Jones
Made me smile
I am a well-travelled reader and writer of stories in the crime thriller genre, reading books by authors such as Child, Connelly or Baldacci. But by way of a change, I came upon this book by Katie Gray. Intrigued by a title which promised something bad had already happened. However, this is the first time I have read something called a cosy crime novel. At first, I was surprised by what I was reading it seemed like something I might have encountered back in my youth. At that stage, I did not realise that the adjective cosy meant so much. I took a few moments to read more about the subgenre where sex and violence or ‘blood and guts’ occur off stage’ so no mess, amateur sleuths get involved in a small community to solve some heinous crime. All done with a sort of whimsical banter and lots of old-fashioned common sense. The result is a comfortable and warm escapist read. You can’t help but smile over it.
Katie’s book does a great job of meeting the expectations of the cosy label. A book of nearly 300 pages, charts the progress of Private Investigators; Pippsy Standage, a character on the right side of ditzy and her phlegmatic husband, Jack, tracking down murderers and other assorted villains. PI Pippsy, is a well-drawn character who manages to get on with things, whether they get her into trouble or not. I think we’ve all met people like that. Indeed I’ve rarely known a character get in and out of so many scrapes in one book. All the way through you can’t help but smile or laugh as the story progresses and we follow the highs and lows of the rest of the characters including of course those unscrupulous villains!
If this is your kind of fiction then you should get the second and third novels in this series and find out how much more trouble the Standages can get themselves into. Although it has not converted me from the ‘blood and guts’ of crime thrillers, I can’t help but smile when I picture Pippsy getting into difficulty and her husband trying to wade in to save her …and then messing up.
Verified Purchase
Vanessa Rockell
Dead On Arrival
This is not the my usual genre and had never heard of a cosy crime thriller but I have to say I thouroughly enjoyed it. It was very entertaining and justhad to keep reading until the end. Well done Katie
Verified Purchase
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Rating: 5.00 out of 5 (3 customer ratings)
Paperback eBook
£9.95
ISBN: 9781908941374
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Description
An enjoyable cosy crime novel. This is the first book in The Dead Series.
Pippsy and Jack Standage are private investigators who visit a luxurious Cotswold hotel for a restful break.
Alas it proves to be anything but restful.
Within a couple of days a car with a dead man in the driving seat arrives at the hotel’s front door. Despite some initial reluctance on Jack’s part, the pair become embroiled in a series of occurrences, which include finding a suitcase full of money in the boot of the dead man’s car and a bag of diamonds lying in the bushes.
The investigating police inspector is perhaps not all he seems, and a number of the other guests look suspicious.
There is an attempt on their lives, and some very nasty people kidnap them more than once! Somehow or other they always manage to extricate themselves, but can they find the criminal brain behind it all?
Further details
Reader reviews and ratings:
I can't get enough cosy crime novels. I particularly liked this one by Katie Gray because it had all the elements I expect in a proper cosy crime book. Keep 'em coming Katie!
Emma Bridges
Rating: 5.00 out of 5 (3 customer ratings)
Reviews
CARMEL
A Great Read
A dead man in the driving seat? Pippsy and Jack Standage couldn’t resist getting involved in the case. The interesting and amusing way they went about solving the mystery made very enjoyable reading.
I was intrigued from the start and made time to put my feet up and read it over three nights. It is an ideal book to relax with on a cold winter night by the fire. It is action packed. The twists and turns in the story kept me totally adsorbed and guessing what the final outcome would be.
This is a great debut novel. Katie Gray has a brilliant imagination. It’s a very well written crime fiction story. I sincerely hope to read more of Pippsy and Jack’s adventures in the near future.
Verified Purchase
Nick Jones
Made me smile
I am a well-travelled reader and writer of stories in the crime thriller genre, reading books by authors such as Child, Connelly or Baldacci. But by way of a change, I came upon this book by Katie Gray. Intrigued by a title which promised something bad had already happened. However, this is the first time I have read something called a cosy crime novel. At first, I was surprised by what I was reading it seemed like something I might have encountered back in my youth. At that stage, I did not realise that the adjective cosy meant so much. I took a few moments to read more about the subgenre where sex and violence or ‘blood and guts’ occur off stage’ so no mess, amateur sleuths get involved in a small community to solve some heinous crime. All done with a sort of whimsical banter and lots of old-fashioned common sense. The result is a comfortable and warm escapist read. You can’t help but smile over it.
Katie’s book does a great job of meeting the expectations of the cosy label. A book of nearly 300 pages, charts the progress of Private Investigators; Pippsy Standage, a character on the right side of ditzy and her phlegmatic husband, Jack, tracking down murderers and other assorted villains. PI Pippsy, is a well-drawn character who manages to get on with things, whether they get her into trouble or not. I think we’ve all met people like that. Indeed I’ve rarely known a character get in and out of so many scrapes in one book. All the way through you can’t help but smile or laugh as the story progresses and we follow the highs and lows of the rest of the characters including of course those unscrupulous villains!
If this is your kind of fiction then you should get the second and third novels in this series and find out how much more trouble the Standages can get themselves into. Although it has not converted me from the ‘blood and guts’ of crime thrillers, I can’t help but smile when I picture Pippsy getting into difficulty and her husband trying to wade in to save her …and then messing up.
Verified Purchase
Vanessa Rockell
Dead On Arrival
This is not the my usual genre and had never heard of a cosy crime thriller but I have to say I thouroughly enjoyed it. It was very entertaining and justhad to keep reading until the end. Well done Katie
Verified Purchase