Cloaked in Malice by Annette Blair
Series: Vintage Magic Mystery series, #5
Berkley Prime Crime
July 2012
Source: Personal copy
There’s nothing Maddie
loves more than fabulous vintage clothes, but the visions she gets while
touching them are starting to wear her down. Even so, when a
beautifully dressed girl comes to Vintage Magic in search of her past,
Maddie isn’t about to turn her away, especially since she bears a
striking resemblance to her good friend Dolly Sweet.When Maddie
touches Paisley Skye’s exquisitely crafted child’s cloak, the vision
she receives is of the ugliest sort: a decades-old case of kidnapping
and murder. To give herself more time to investigate, Maddie enlists the
help of her FBI Agent boyfriend Nick and takes Paisley into her own
home. But when Dolly suddenly skips town, Maddie realizes that
uncovering the folds of Paisley’s past will reveal more than one vintage
crime…
My thoughts: This is the 5th book in Annette Blair’s Vintage Magic cozy mystery series and while I usually love these stories, I wasn’t particularly crazy about this particular one. The series itself is light, and fun, with just the right amount of the paranormal without being too much, at least for this reader! I love the idea of being able to “read” fashions – I am completely fascinated by the idea that each item of vintage clothing has a story to tell.
I think one of the reasons I had a harder time with this particular book was that I was not crazy about the character of Paisley. For some reason she just rubbed me the wrong way and so it made reading about her was almost like a chore. I couldn’t decide if she was just completely naive or a grand manipulator. Luckily, there was plenty of other action not involving her that helped me get through the book. I love when Dante, resident ghost of Maddie’s shop makes appearances. And of course Dolly is another favorite – especially when she is able to be near Dante.
Because I have enjoyed the four previous books, I plan on continuing with this series, hoping the next one is back to type of story I’ve come to enjoy in this series. Have you ever been reading a series and one book just turned you completely off?
Books in this series:
- A Veiled Deception
- Larceny & Lace
- Death by Diamonds
- Skirting the Grave
- Cloaked in Malice
- Tulle Death Do Us Part
Thanks for sharing your honest thoughts. It's harder to enjoy a book when you don't like the main character.
It is and I hate writing reviews like that, but not going to lie in them either.
I have the first on in this series. I think I bought them for the covers—yep I am guilty of that (more than once).
Sad about not liking the main character 🙁
Oh…the first 4 books were great and this one would have been if I just liked the one character. Hopefully she won't be in anymore!
I haven't read anything by her but have one of her books on my TBR shelves. Thank you for your honest review.
I did not realize that Annette Blair had this series out. I read part of her witch series – the one with The Kitchen Witch. 🙂 This sounds like fun!