Dressed to Kilt by Hannah Reed

First Line: "It's like living inside a snow globe," I said to Vicki MacBride over afternoon tea at the kitchen table in my toasty warm cottage.

Well into December, it's less than a month until Eden Elliott's visa expires forcing her return to the United States. She has mixed emotions about it, but she is making plans for her homecoming. Nevertheless, while she's still in the Highlands of Scotland, she's going for the gusto-- which includes a formal whiskey tasting with the local hunk-in-a-kilt, Leith Cameron. The event turns into a disaster when a woman is found drowned in one of the vats in the distillery.

As Special Constable, Eden immediately steps in to help solve the case, but things get sticky when she realizes that the killer could be amongst the branches of her own Scottish family tree.

This tightly plotted mystery introduces readers to something that they should not miss while they are in the Highlands: the whisky distillery. Whisky is big business, and there are tours that will take you from one distillery to another, although there's no need to do that here with one right in the book.

Besides whisky, we also have samples of a truly cringeworthy Ugly American, and the fine art of writing romance novels-- which is why Eden went there in the first place. In order to solve the murder, Eden is forced to delve into her own family history whether she wants to or not, and Inspector Jamieson appears to be relying on her more and more as the series progresses. Which brings me to my sticking point. 

I still can't buy into the idea that a newly-arrived American who's completely unfamiliar with Scottish law would be made a constable in the police force. Yes, it's a tiny village. Yes, she is just a Special Constable... but I just can't buy into it. However, that does not mean I can't recognize well-developed characters and finely crafted mysteries when I see them, and Hannah Reed's Scottish Highlands series is both enjoyable and well-written.
   

Dressed to Kilt by Hannah Reed

eISBN: 9781101614006

Berkley Prime Crime © 2016

eBook, 300 pages

Cozy Mystery, #3 Scottish Highlands mystery

Rating: B+

Source: Purchased from Amazon.


 

Hooked on Ewe by Hannah Reed

First Line: "You should've asked my opinion before you went off half-cocked," Kirstine MacBride-Derry scolded her half-sister Vicki from behind the counter of the wool and yarn shop they owned together on the outskirts of Glenkillen, a small village in the Scottish Highlands on the North Sea, along a protected bay called Moray Firth.

It's all hands on deck for the Glenkillen sheep dog trials, which is the last big fundraiser for the local hospice. Although she can't exactly remember how, newcomer Eden Elliott volunteered her services and has been trying to avoid Isla Lindsey, the bossiest, most infuriating woman on the planet, ever since. Having sent in the manuscript of her first romance novel, Eden would much rather help her friend Vicki in Sheepish Expressions, a shop co-owned by Vicki and her sister Kirstine. But there's no time to help distribute the first of Vicki's Skein-of-the-Month packages to subscribers once Isla's body is found.

Isla was strangled with yarn from one of the Skein-of-the-Month packages, and as a newly created Special Constable, Eden feels she has the right and the responsibility to find Isla's killer.

I really enjoy Hannah Reed's Scottish Highlands cozy series, particularly for the setting. In Hooked on Ewe, Reed gives us a good look at a staple in the Highlands: sheep dog trials. Having seen them myself in the beautiful little village of Luss, I appreciated Reed's description. We're also treated to a bit of knitting, and Eden climbs aboard a boat and goes out into the Moray Firth.

The mystery is a good one, involving quite a chase around the suspect list, and Reed applies a strong dash of humor-- especially in the relationship between Inspector Jamieson and Constable Stevens. Jamieson prefers working solo, and since Stevens annoys the stuffing out of him, Jamieson is always dreaming up busy work for the constable to get him out of his hair. Constable Stevens is coming into his own a bit because he has a particularly funny scene all his own.

There's an added bonus in this series. Since Eden is an aspiring author, readers are treated to some of the creative as well as the nuts-and-bolts publishing processes in writing. However, as much as I enjoyed Hooked on Ewe, I did have a few problems with it. First of all, I cannot believe that any police force in Scotland would agree to give someone special constable status when she's on a six-month tourist visa that's half over. I was also a bit puzzled over the motivations of the dead woman, but I can't say any more because I'd have to divulge too much of the plot.

The third thing that bugged me was a point of geography, which won't bother readers who haven't traveled extensively in Scotland. I have, so when I read that a character's sister, who was returning to Glasgow from a holiday on the Isle of Skye, decided to swing past Glenkillen to pick up her Skein-of-the-Month package, it just didn't add up. People in the UK don't tend to drive long distances. If you had to pay what they do for gasoline, you'd understand why. The drive between Glasgow and Skye is long enough on its own-- and Glenkillen is in the exact opposite direction by more than just a few miles. I know. I'm being picky!

Geography aside, I enjoy the mysteries and the characters in this series. I look forward to my next visit.

Hooked on Ewe by Hannah Reed

ISBN: 9780425265833

Berkley Prime Crime © 2015

Mass Market Paperback, 304 pages

Cozy Mystery, #2 Scottish Highlands mystery

Rating: B

Source: Purchased at The Poisoned Pen


 

Off Kilter by Hannah Reed

First Line: Sometimes my best friend, Ami, can go way overboard.

To say that life's been tough for Eden Elliott would be an understatement. The long-term care of her seriously ill mother put an end to her marriage. The divorce is final, and now her mother is dead. Eden's made a deal to write a romance novel, but she feels as though she needs some sort of jumpstart. That's where best friend-- and bestselling romance author-- Ami Pederson comes in. Ami sends Eden on an open-ended visit to the village of Glenkillen in the Scottish Highlands. There Eden plans to do some firsthand research and start writing that book. But fate has other plans.

The local sheep shearer has been murdered with his own shears, and the villagers in Glenkillen suspect Vicki MacBride, an outsider whose surprise inheritance of her father's estate put the future of her half sister and her brother-in-law in serious doubt. But Eden can't believe that her new friend is capable of murder, so in between bouts of research and writing, Eden determines to do what she can to catch a killer.

I simply had to read this first book in the Scottish Highlands cozy series because of its setting. Although I never did quite figure out where Glenkillen is supposed to be, I certainly enjoyed my vicarious trip to an area I love so much. 

This first book sets the series up well. Everything about the murder is leading us to believe that the evildoers are Vicki's half sister and her brother-in-law, but sooner or later readers are going to wonder if that solution is a bit too obvious. Or could it be meant to look obvious?  Hmm.... I began to wonder about that from the beginning and found the solution rather easy to deduce, but I was enjoying watching Eden Elliott try to adjust to the Highlands too much to care. (Which goes to show that there's always more to crime fiction than the answer to whodunnit.)

Eden is thirty-eight. After caring for her mother for so long, she's not flighty and she has common sense. I wouldn't say that she's all that mechanically inclined with her talk of "whatchamacallits," "thingamabobs," and "doohickeys," and it puzzled me that she didn't do a little bit of research before she headed off on her first-ever trip outside the U.S. For example, she flies into Inverness where she picks up a rental car to drive to Glenkillen. Only then does she learn that you have to reserve a car that has automatic transmission-- and those cars are at a premium. Being stuck learning a stick shift at the very same time that you're trying to remember to drive on the opposite side of the road and navigate roundabouts is not a recipe for success. The bright spot in all this is that a handsome Scotsman comes to her rescue when she becomes stranded. 

The further along Eden gets in her investigation, she finds herself with two handsome Scotsmen giving her the eye, and I have to admit that-- although I'm not much for romance in my reading-- Eden's two men are the best romantic interests I've encountered in a long time. (I may not care for romance in my books, but I'm not dead.) And as far as that investigation goes, my liking for Eden increased because she kept the detective inspector handling the case in the loop with everything she finds. That inspector happens to be saddled with a particularly annoying special constable, and his attempts to avoid the young man not only become a running joke in the book, the situation also has Eden becoming more involved with the local people and the community.

At the beginning of Off Kilter, that little village of Glenkillen had me worried because when Eden first comes on the scene, it's definitely a case of us (the villagers) versus her (Eden), but as they all get to know each other better, this changes, which is a very good thing for the book and for the series. 

Off Kilter has definitely "primed my pump" (so to speak) for more books in this series, and I'm also secretly hoping that Eden has to make a trip to certain areas of Glasgow, where the Scottish accent really is almost impossible to understand!
 

Off Kilter by Hannah Reed

ISBN: 9780425265826

Berkley Prime Crime © 2014 

Mass Market Paperback, 304 pages

Cozy mystery, #1 Scottish Highlands mystery

Rating: B+

Source: Purchased at The Poisoned Pen.