I don’t enjoy reading women’s fiction and this book is women’s fiction, so please keep that in mind when you read this review. I shall do my best to correct for my preferences, but it’s best to be upfront about these things.

So why on earth did I pick it up? Well, it was the premise you see. It totally sucked me in. I was so curious how this set up would unfold because this novel has a very good blurb – it accurately sums up what you’re about to read.

When thirty-four-year-old Cath loses her mostly absentee mother, she is ambivalent. With days of quiet, unassuming routine in Buffalo, New York, Cath consciously avoids the impulsive, thrill-seeking lifestyle that her mother once led. But when she’s forced to go through her mother’s things one afternoon, Cath is perplexed to find tickets for an upcoming “murder week” in England’s Peak. A whole town has come together to stage a fake murder mystery to attract tourism to their quaint hamlet. Baffled but helplessly intrigued by her mother’s secret purchase, Cath decides to go on the trip herself—and begins a journey she never could have anticipated.

Teaming up with her two cottage-mates, both ardent mystery lovers—Wyatt Green, forty, who works unhappily in his husband’s birding store, and Amity Clark, fifty, a divorced romance writer struggling with her novels—Cath sets about solving the “crime” and begins to unravel shocking truths about her mother along the way. Amidst a fling—or something more—with the handsome local maker of artisanal gin, Cath and her irresistibly charming fellow sleuths will find this week of fake murder may help them face up to a very real crossroads in their own lives.

Witty, wise, and deliciously escapist, Welcome to Murder Week is a fresh, inventive twist on the murder mystery and a touching portrayal of one daughter’s reckoning with her grief, her past—and her own budding sense of adventure.

I’ve never read a story that features a ‘murder week’ like this one does and I really enjoyed it. The mystery elements are really well-plotted and I found it very satisfying to read. One potential downside is that because the murder was fake, the mystery plot presented only an interesting puzzle to solve and not a source of tension. There were hints of competition with other teams, but as Cath and her housemates work on the mystery, the competition doesn’t really feature much at all.

The source of tension comes from elsewhere and that is, as alluded to in the blurb, unravelling ‘shocking truths’ about Cath’s mother. I won’t discuss them here as when the truth is revealed it is genuinely shocking. However, this particular plotline only emerges later, so for the first stretch, there is no tension to speak of.

The romantic subplot is kind of flat. I had an echo of butterflies in my tummy, but ultimately the romance did not deliver for me. Now is this a feature of the lower importance placed on romance in women’s fiction? Is my struggle with this particular book or with the genre? I can’t say for sure. But do not read this if you need a deep, abiding romantic connection at the end and a tension-filled journey to that HEA.

As this is women’s fiction, I feel it is only right that I indicate whether there is a HEA. Click for the reveal.

I can’t help but feel that there would have been much richer, more nuanced emotions if it were a romance. Alas, it is not. But again, that’s not the book’s fault. Lara, let it go!

Just one more point on the emotional side of things: the shocking truths, when they are revealed, are very shocking and because we don’t have that rich emotional depth in the build up to that reveal, Cath’s coping with the shock is kind of flat emotionally. There are tears, yes, but in a few paragraphs it’s all neatly tidied away and sorted. But could this be a feature and not a bug? It’s hard to say for sure. I was surprised at the heaviness of the reveal. It’s a tragic series of events (historical) but at the start of the story,

With the mystery element being pretty wholesome, the romance being a bit one-note, and the ‘shocking truths’ coming late in the story, much of this novel could be categorised as ‘low stakes’ with the entirety of it being described as ‘cosy’. It does not strain the nerves. This week, I wanted that intense tension; at other times, this cosy story would be exactly what I’m looking for.

Just a note on the comparisons drawn between the States and the UK. It comes up relatively often as Cath and her housemates are American and the action takes place mostly in a small English village. I can honestly not say either way if the stereotypes/characteristics discussed are true, annoying, false, offensive or just silly. I’m a Zimbabwean living in South Africa so I’m a hopeless judge of it.

Back to the grade though. At another time, this would have been great for me. I would advise picking this up only when it meets your current needs around tension and intrigue – also as long as you don’t mind the romance playing third fiddle. As a cosy bit of women’s fiction, it’s great.