Death, Dismay and Rose - stay away...

 

Death, Dismay, and Rose

by JC Eaton

2/5 stars

⭐⭐

Death, Dismay, and Rose had potential, but for me, it sort of fell flat. 

I think this may have been part of a series, and perhaps others who have read the series enjoyed it more. 

There were passages that were fairly well- written, where there was suspense, and you wondered how things were going to play out. 

I was very disappointed in the way the author treated food and drink throughout the book. 

For a book ostensibly centered around a winery, there was none of the poetry of wine and wine tasting, or the fun "cellar" experience of being a wine-maker. 

In addition, I was just downright annoyed with the food, every other page the protagonist is telling us what she got for lunch, but doesn't actually DESCRIBE it. 

For example, I got a tuna on rye for lunch 

but not, my tuna on rye was just what I needed, the toast was lightly browned, tart, and crunchy under the flaky, tuna, swimming in rich mayonnaise and counterpointed by the crunch of pickles and onion. 

Either describe it well or forget about it. So you had a sandwich - who cares?

The only meal that got even halfway decent treatment was the wine-maker dinner.

I also found some of the action a bit of a stretch, I think the main character would have been locked up long before the end for her meddling in police business.. 

All in all, I cannot recommend this book- your time is better spent elsewhere. 

Thanks to NetGalley for a free ARC, my opinions are my own.

I finished reading this book late in Nov 2020.