Grave Reservations (The Booking Agents, #1)

 

Before I read this book, I’d never heard of Cherie Priest, so I went into this with no particular expectations.  All I knew is the blurb about a quirky psychic travel agent teaming up to solve a mystery with the detective she saved from an ill-fated flight sounded like good, possibly ridiculous, fun, and why the heck not?  Besides … that adorably fun cover totally suckered me in.  They get me every time.

I can definitively say that the story was as adorably fun as the cover.  I’ve always loved my TV mystery shows, just like I loved my Nancy Drew and Encyclopedia Brown books back in the day.  Moonlighting was my jam in the 80’s, Murder She Wrote in the 90’s, Monk in the early 2000’s, The Mentalist right after that. (What’s up with all those ‘M’s??  Seriously … I have a type).  If someone told me this book was going to be made into a TV series, I would be a happy girl.  Is it brilliant or earth-shattering? No.  Is it good, solid, silly, happy fun?  A resounding YES.  It was just what I needed after my last bummer read.

Leda Foley, the struggling owner/travel agent at Foley’s Flights of Fancy, and part-time performer of a one-woman show, Klairvoyant Karaoke, is an often booze-infused psychic trying to get her business off the ground and get over the murder three years prior of her fiance, Tod.  Along for the ride, is her even bigger hot mess of a best friend, Niki Nelson, who has absolutely no filter on her words or actions.  I loved these two, in the same way I loved Finlay Donovan and Vero, or as mentioned in the book, Lucy and Ethel - they’re just a great pair.  Playing the straight man to this comical pair is Grady Merritt, the Seattle detective who Leda saves from a doomed flight when she senses trouble.

When Grady asks Leda to offer her psychic insights into a cold case he hasn’t been able to solve, their worlds collide in ways she wasn’t expecting.  The story is engaging as she tries to make sense of her increasing abilities and the ways they manifest in each situation.  I haven’t read a proper cozy mystery, but I suspect this would largely qualify.  There’s humor and a fun cast of characters, but there’s also a decent mystery and lots of potential suspects to keep you guessing.  The mystery itself isn’t the most dynamic one ever, but the characters more than made up for any plot weakness.  

The blurb compares this book to Lisa Lutz’s The Spellman Files and Charlaine Harris’s Aurora Teagarden series.  I can’t speak to that having never read either of those, but if they’re anything like this one, I’d probably like them.  I can only hope this book will be the start of a series too, because I would LOVE more adventures with Leda, Niki and Grady!  

I found out, after the fact, that Cherie Priest has mostly written horror, fantasy, sci-fi and steampunk up to this point.  I’d have never guessed that from this book, but kudos to her for being able to switch gears so successfully.  For the fun story behind this book, here’s a link to her blog describing how the story came to be:  

https://www.cheriepriest.com/blog

★★★★ ½  (rounded up to 5 for getting me out of a reading funk) 

Thanks to Atria Books, NetGalley and author Cherie Priest for this ARC in exchange for my honest opinions.  It’s due for publication on October 26, 2021.