SAY NO MOOR brings Emily Micelli to a charming cottage B&B on the Cornish coast. She and her husband operate a travel agency for seniors from Iowa, normally. On this occasion Emily's tourists are joined by six travel bloggers getting a discount. Also by a gender-reassigned lady, Jackie, with a personal connection to Emily. Confusingly the B&B hosts are partners called Enyon and Lance, and Lance the chef is a bruiser from New Jersey who has to be written for the comedy. I did think Cornwall had quite enough character, drama, and contrast without this overstated addition, but I also thought maybe he would grow on me in the course of the story.

Some of the bloggers don't get along. The Jane Austen fan can't abide the one who reads the like of PRIDE AND PREJUDICE AND ZOMBIES. They're all far too ready to film any drama on their phones and upload it. The regular tourists, replacement joints or limbs making them more timid, aren't sure they are getting a good deal compared to the noisy bloggers. In all the chaos, an accident occurs. Could someone have intended malice? A death on the tour isn't the publicity Emily hoped for, even near haunted Bodmin Moor.

Much cantankerousness, chat, sarcasm, and charm go along with this group of seniors and younger bloggers. I'd previously read BONNIE OF EVIDENCE which took the same seniors to Scottish castles. Just as with that book, once I'd got over the running commentary by them all and their determination to each be center stage, I enjoyed their company. Happily metal-detecting on a windswept beach, walking the causeway to St. Michael's Mount, stepping in to cook when the cook is indisposed, taking selfies, entertaining the group of an evening, they are really living up their retirement. You don't need to love each one to know that they are doing something right. As for the writers, they were up past midnight tweaking their daily posts.

This book could also be called a series of odd events, including thefts, a vanishing person, and deaths. Give yourself a treat and read the commotion, as Maddy Hunter has excelled herself with SAY NO MOOR. I love it.

Book Summary