The audiobook version of this novel is narrated extremely well, with the prose flowing and the imagery coming across brilliantly. This murder mystery is set between London and a small town in England, which seems quaint but is everything but! The two main characters, Annie and Francis, take us on a journey across time and generations, with two murders being explored through the arc of the novel. All characters are well fleshed out and detailed, and the writing is so immersive it felt like being in Castle Knoll! This small town mystery draws you in from its very premise, of Francis trying to solve her own murder before even being dead. The story is clever and engaging, and the setting is just idyllic!
Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for sharing an advance copy in exchange for this honest review.

How To Solve Your Own Murder by Kristen Perrin
(Narrated by Alexandra Dowling; Jaye Jacobs)

Such an enjoyable read for me. The storyplot is unique. I love the dual timeline. The twists at the end were surprising that I could not see it was coming like this.

The narrators did perfect job. They played all the characters very well. This is one of the most impressive and amazing audiobooks I have ever read.

Many thanks to NetGalley, Quercus and the author for my copy!

Pub date: March 26, 2024

This was an enjoyable mystery. It was quite slow in places, but did pick up towards the end. I enjoyed the dual timelines and the range of characters. Definitely recommended for people who like an old fashioned mystery! I will look out for more by this author. Thank you to Netgalley and the publishers.

Really enjoyed the audio version of How to Solve Your own murder - thought the actors narrated all the different voices really well. I absolutely fell in love with this book. Kristen Perrin has created a gorgeous world. The present day and 1965 timelines are peopled with charming and intriguing characters and it’s fascinating to see how they’ve changed - or not. The story in both times was so compelling that I almost couldn’t bear to leave one for the other.
Annie is an adorable, quirky sleuth, who is tasked with the job of solving the murder of her Great Aunt Frances. Frances lived her life in the shadow of an ominous fairground fortune told in 1965, which predicted her own murder, so spent her life trying to catch her own killer and her friend Emily’s too. The mystery within a mystery, and dual timeline structure tickled my brain in the most satisfying way. After all, who doesn’t love to read an old diary? Reading Frances’s diary in the 1965 timeline was as fascinating to me as it was to Annie - and just like Annie, I longed for her to have met her Great-aunt.
The characters are all interesting and you really want to know what happened to them. It was fun - and sad - to see how they’ve changed from 1965 to the present.
How the puzzle of the murders is solved is really clever, with the repercussions of what happened in the past echo-ing into the present. The hint of romance between Annie and the hunky detective is soooo delectable.
The ending was very satisfying but I’m sad to leave these characters behind. So I’m delighted that there’s going to be more!

I loved this audio book. The story was a old school murder mystery and I was gripped from start to finish. So many twists and was fun to try and work out who the murderer was.

This was so much fun -I was so intrigued by the blurb but also for the links to knives out and murders in the building. For a change it lived up to the hype and references. Just thoroughly enjoyed it. The narration worked really well. I just devoured this as it was so charming and entertaining and everything else got put aside.

I was given an advance copy by netgalley and the publishers but the review is entirely my own.

A fortune teller tells Frances she will be murdered and so she spent her life trying to work out who could the killer be. Following her death these clues must be followed and whoever solves the murder will inherit millions. Annie is just one trying to seek the truth, but who will inherit Frances’ fortune?

A well written and well narrated novel (I listened to the audiobook). Good characters and good storyline. Lots of twists and turns. Not everyone will play fair and thing will become dangerous.

I was hooked! I love this different take on a murder mystery. Frances has always been convinced that she was going to be murdered, and she was! Leaving a hefty inheritance to be fought over, the only way to gain such inheritance is to solve her murder. The book goes back and forth from present time to the 60s, but is easy to follow. There are a lot of characters which can sometimes be a little confusing but it was easy to get back into the swing of the story.
A gripping read (listen) and was well paced and kept your attention. Great for any murder mystery fans looking for an easy, entertaining book!

I enjoyed this audiobook very much, listening to it at 1.2x speed. The narration was good, with clear diction and engaging delivery. The plot, which moves between the 60s and now, is well-conceived with a large cast of suspects for the reader/listener to keep on top of. I liked the descriptions of the Dorset countryside and village, which I recognised, and of the 60s vibe which was also familiar! I shall be looking out for more fun mystery stories by this author.

Actual rating 4.5.

I cannot tell you how much I loved this book - it was just the kind of warm, addictive crime novel I was in the mood for, and I knew from the very first page that it was the kind of read I’d zoom through!

I don’t know what it was exactly, but the plot, characters, setting and writing kept me captivated throughout. There is a cosiness to it, mostly because of the location and how lovely Annie is as a lead character, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t dark at times - from a young girl’s disappearance to Frances’s murder and all the secrets which that unravels. It was a great whodunnit with a whole village full of people with the motive to kill Frances, so I kept changing my mind about who the killer was right until the moment they were revealed - and even then I could still be surprised! I also must admit I loved Annie’s blossoming friendship (romance?🤞) with the detective and I’m especially desperate for book two just so I can see what happens there - plus that ending left me wanting more too!

If you are looking for a clever, compelling and cosy mystery which somehow makes you feel uplifted by the end, then I can’t recommend this enough - it was a joy to listen to! Another exciting new voice in fiction!

This was such a fun read. I thoroughly enjoyed it and could not stop listening. It's nicely paced, really intriguing and quite a classic type of cozy murder mystery. We follow Annie who is, through the will of her great-aunt Frances, tasked with solving her great-aunt's murder in order to inherit her estate. Based on a life-long prophecy made by a fortune teller in her youth who foretold that her death will be a murder, great-aunt Frances has spent her life trying to solve her own, not yet happened, murder. In her will she creates a game where the person who solves her murder first wins her wealth. Annie thus sets out to do just that, and we follow her journey, whilst also getting glimpses into young Frances life through her diary, which involves another mystery. Side by side the past and present unravels as we go along, culminating in a big reveal at the end. The audiobook narrator was fantastic, and I just really enjoyed myself. My only note is that the audiobook had longer pauses between sentences than often felt natural, but I assume that will get edited before publication.

Thanks so much to the publisher for the ARC provided through NetGalley!

Not a bad book, but I don't think it particularly stands out against other amateur sleuth books. It was entertaining, and I liked the way the narrator interpreted the book, but I think the characters could have been developed a bit more in depth, especially in the present time line.

This was such a fun book. I wasn’t sure what to expect when i started but i ended up completely hooked and raced through the audiobook listening late into the night. The narrator was really great atkeeping me engaged and differentiating between characters. The story was really interesting and I loved learning more about the secrets with the main character until we got all the parts and put it together.

At the age of seventeen Frances Adams visits a fortune teller and receives a chilling prediction, that she will be murdered. For the next sixty years, Frances lives in fear of her fortune coming true and tries to solve the cryptic clues the fortune teller gave. On the day she is going to meet her great-niece Annabelle for the first time she is murdered and it is up to Annabelle to piece together the clues Frances has collected to try and solve the murder.

How To Solve Your Own Murder by Kristen Perrin is an old-school murder mystery. Set in a mansion in a small village there is a cast of larger-than-life characters, many of whom have a motive for murder. Saxon Gravesdown, another of the possible beneficiaries, came across as a classic villain. The narration makes you feel as if you are in the middle of events.

Annabelle knows of her great-aunt's existence but has never met her. When Frances announces that Annabelle is to be a beneficiary in her will she has to finally meet her great-aunt. On the very day of the meeting Frances is murdered, bringing about a prediction that was made almost sixty years previously. Frances has left instructions with her solicitor, whoever solves her murder will inherit her vast fortune, but they only have a week to solve the murder.

As everyone tries to solve the murder the story periodically jumps back in time and we learn about Frances and her close friends Emily and Rose in their late teens. The trio share a strong friendship, however jealousy begins to creep in as romance appears on the horizon.

I enjoyed the way in which the past and the present were woven together. Subtle clues from the past are dropped to help you try and solve the mystery of Emily's disappearance and Frances' murder. There is also some misdirection thrown in for good measure. I certainly didn't solve the mystery before the killer was revealed.

I enjoyed this audiobook and would recommend it to fans of the genre, it gives out Agatha Christie vibes and the main character, Annie, is very likable. What's not to like about a fortune teller's prediction coming true many years later? And the fact that Annie, has never met her great aunt Frances and therefore, we go through the clues with her, and get to know the victim together as the mystery unfolds, makes the story more interesting. The time jumps between past and present are really good and make Frances feel more relatable, not just an old, quirky lady who was killed. A lot of well plotted twists and some highly unlikable characters, make for a fun read!
The narrator was very good and kept my attention (although I do struggle with audiobooks slightly).

A really enjoyable murder mystery with a fantastic cast of characters. The plot ticked along nicely and I had absolutely no idea who the murderer was. I loved that I was kept guessing throughout. Only docked a star as I struggled to differentiate characters at times but otherwise liked the narrator.

This story begins in 1965, where teenager Frances Adams receives a fortune at a local fair. She is given a number of cryptic clues and told that she will be murdered. Frances spends her whole life trying to make sense of it and solve the crime that hasn't yet been committed.
This tale is interspersed with the current day, where Frances' fortune comes true and she is murdered, and her great niece, Annie, is summoned to a meeting to discuss the Estate. Annie is thrown into a detective role where she learns all about her great aunt's life and those around her, finding that many may have reason to have killed her. Before long, Annie realises that her own life may be in danger too.

At it's heart, this book is an old-school murder mystery, which I absolutely love. I enjoyed the way that the past and present stories cleverly weaved together, giving the reader a little more information each time.

The characters were well written and I loved learning about Frances and her friends in their teenage years. I didn't guess any of the many twists along the way, which made it all the more enjoyable to read.

My thanks to NetGalley and the Publishers for sending me this ARC in return for an honest review.

A truly unputdownable mystery. I ate this up in one sitting, completely hooked on the investigation and all the characters tied up in it. I'm so glad I chose to listen to the audiobook as it was very well narrated by two distinctly engaging performers.

The setting is captivating; a bustling, tight knit village with a constant hum of low-stakes drama. Despite this classic setup, I didn't feel like I was being fed stereotypes at any point. Every character feels important, fully realised and relatable in some small way, no matter how shady or conniving they seemed. Annie is attempting to solve the murder in the present day, but every other chapter is an entry from Frances' teenage journals. This is fantastic narrative choice in propelling the investigation forward and endearing us (and Annie) to Frances, despite never getting the chance to meet her in the present day timeline.

It is listed as the first book in a series and I can't wait for the next instalment. There are loose ends that I'd love to see Annie tie up, and I also just want to spend more time in Castle Knoll with the locals because I miss it.

Thank you so so much to Quercus for the advance audio!

A well-constructed, solidly written murder mystery novel with sufficient twists and turns to keep you engaged, though the payout doesn’t deliver as one would’ve hoped. Entertaining enough to pass the time, but not one that will stay with you for long after you’re done. 3.5 out of 5. Thank you NetGalley for the advance audiobook.

Whilst I started reading this book with some confusion and frustration at the authors decision to base the story in Dorset using the very real village of Corfe Castle but bizarrely renaming it, I soon found myself drawn in to the suspenseful and engaging writing.
A great addition to the cosy crime genre. I really enjoyed how the story unfolded through the combination of diary entries and the evidence gathering of Annie. The characters were believable and likeable. The suspense was maintained well with the reader being left with a variety of suspects until the big reveal.
Overall a good read and mostly well written. Some descriptive sections were rather over done and the aforementioned mystery of renaming a well known Dorset village were the main criticisms.