I would like to give 3.5, but can't here, unfortunately. This book takes a little while to get going; we’re 25% of the way through before there is a murder, and given the title and the genre, this feels a little unusual. (I wasn't sure whether I was wrong about this, but a rough straw poll of other readers suggested a death in the first 10% would be expected, with 20% at the outside. I'd love to know what other people think!) A lot of the preceding content IS important/relevant, but I don't think the narrative structure needed to be organised so strictly chronologically, and there were plenty of ways in which material could have been woven in elsewhere.

Nevertheless, this is a pleasing cosy in many ways, and I enjoy the successful mid-life "spinster" main character; there are some moments of great pathos and humanity, as well as great humour and tenderness in the relationships she has with long-standing and new friends along the way. It's great to get back to the very genuine heart of the detective fiction genre, when in the nineteenth century snooping (or thieving!) servants were a major concern and so many of the female detectives of the period went about their work by slipping into a maid's uniform.

On minor grumbles: I don't think the first four Holmes stories were published in Beeton’s annuals. The first, certainly, but it's not clear this is true for the others, published in Lippincotts (Sign of Four) and then The Strand (where the majority of the rest also appeared). And hopefully the final edit will catch some of the blips (repost for riposte, errant prepositions, Jinks for Jinx, there’s a weird “herself” instead of “her” that makes it sound like Alice is cuddling up on the sofa with Camille, etc.)

I do love a cozy crime book and this delivered. Good story lines and nice characters. I look forward to further books

This is a fun Christmas book for fans of cosy detective stories. Packed with quirky characters, this takes us from upper class London (from the eyes of the staff mainly) to a crumbling country home.
Alice Beeton is a delightfully quirky lead character - she runs an agency providing domestic staff, and lives with her dachshund Agatha - a nod to Miss Christie perhaps?
When one of her staff is found dead she gets dragged into investigating - and can't back out when Agatha is used to ensure her cooperation.
The story also brings in her impecunious brother, heir to the family estate and his wanna-be influencer wife.
Lots of fun and quirky twists and turns, this is a great pre-Christmas read for a taste of snowy England.

A solid, Christmassy detective read - sometimes a bit too twee for my taste but I liked seeing Alice come into her own and start having her own adventures. Some good twists and turns in the plot as well so this book won't be drawing in readers just from the recipes alone!

December, modern day, London: Miss Alice Beeton runs a placement agency, the Good Household Management Agency, which provides domestic staff to wealthy people needing a maid, housekeeper, chef or other servant. No sooner has she hired someone new, Enya, then she gets a request for a new housekeeper from the uber wealthy Messants who's housekeeper has abruptly left. Miss Beeton immediately sends her out. Unfortunately, Enya is killed a few weeks later. The powers that be want it dismissed as a burglary gone wrong (against the detective’s wishes, it should be noted); however, when Miss Beeton gets the opportunity to do some snooping on her own, she takes it, becoming Messents’ new replacement housekeeper. It also helps that she can use the generous salary they are paying and that she has no place to live at the moment as her basement flat is unlivable having been damaged by the renovations going on upstairs.

I picked this up thinking it was a historical novel, maybe set in the 1920s or 1930s, with the reference to ‘Miss’ in the title and the comments about baking, housekeeping, Miss Beeton’s comments about not having a family, etc - all seem to be from bygone days. But no - it’s modern day with computers and cell phones which…was disconcerting. I actually gave up at one point, deciding to restart it a few days later with the different mindset. I’m glad I did as it was an enjoyable book. Bits of it were a little implausible, but still fun. I’m looking forward to more stories with Miss Beeton. She feels like a character that’s been trod on by her family (with her brother constantly asking for money so he can be 'lord of the manor' and not work) and society (especially her landlord), living in the past to a degree, and is now coming into her own. The book ends with the detective showing up, saying he’d like her insights to a case he’s currently working on - over dinner - suggesting a possible future for the series and a new romantic relationship for Miss Beeton.

Recommended. I received a copy of this from NetGalley.com that I voluntarily chose to review.

Miss Beeton runs an agency that supplies staff to rich families in London. Her own background is not too shabby, being related to the Mrs Beeton of Household Management fame. Although her agency is a success, everything else in Alice's life is a mess. She is sustained by her dog, Agatha, her love of detective novels and her baking skills. This is not where she thought her life would take her, yet here she is.

Placing a housekeeper at the home of a wealthy art dealer and his family she is shocked to discover that not only is the housekeeper not who she seems to be, but she is murdered at a New Year's Eve party. Alice steps up to investigate.

This is the first in a new, cosy crime series written by Lloyd. It's not my usual type of read but it was a quick, entertaining read and perfect for any cosy crime fans who you might be looking to buy a book for Christmas for.

Not every book is for every reader and this book was not for me. Let me be very clear, there is nothing wrong with this book but all the things that are right with it do not appeal to me. Cozy crime with pretty people and endings tied up in neat bows are not my cup of tea but if that’s what you enjoy then give this book a read I’m sure you will enjoy it.

I enjoyed this character-driven story. The main characters are well-written and work together well. I thought it was a bit long-winded, it was about two-thirds of the way through the book before you learn about the possible crime that might be the reason for the earlier murder. But once Alice is forced to investigate she proves extremely capable, and has a tight-knit group of friends supporting her, with all the specialist skills between them that are required to make their sleuthing successful.

On the other hand, by expanding the story so that the reader gets to know all the characters sets up a series of books perfectly, and I would look forward to reading them.

recipes, cozy-crime, golden-age-mysteries, amateur-sleuth, pet-dog, England, local-law-enforcement, investigation, murder, not-TTS-enabled, Christmas-season, dognappers, class-consciousness, wealthy, situational-humor, sly-humor****

Alice Beeton runs the Good Household Management Agency which provides domestic staff to the wealthy and seems to be a distant relative the renowned author Mrs Beeton. A woman presents herself for employment and is shortly sent to a very respectable home. Yet she is murdered there and we are introduced to Detective Rigby of the Met. Now the fun begins as the investigations cross each other, the plot keeps twisting, and recipes pop up just anywhere. Good fun, but I can see where it would be impossible to make it TTS enabled unless the recipes were gathered at the end.
I requested and received a free temporary EARC from HQ via NetGalley. Thank you!
Pub Date Oct 24, 2024 #MissBeetonsMurderAgency #NetGalley

I had thought that I would enjoy this cosy crime mystery, however on this occasion I made the wrong choice. The book is a disappointment, it is very long winded and overly descriptive of mundane situations. The main character Alice Beeton seems to. be one of life’s put- upon people, exploited and bled dry financially by her feckless brother, and her natural good nature taken advantage of by others. I wanted to give her a shake on several occasions.
Allegedly descended from the original Mrs Beeton, famed in days gone by for her housekeeping book, and referred to frequently by Alice, as if it were her Bible, gives the excuse to insert many recipes into the text, though in the e-reader version, they are formatted as to be completely incomprehensible. This pads the book out unnecessarily.
I’m not sure why this fashion for including recipes within the narrative of a novel has become so popular, but this is the third such novel I’ve read in the last six months. I’m not a fan, as I’m never likely to try to cook/ bake these dishes.
The actual murder, and the immediate aftermath, when Alice goes to investigate, complete with dog Agatha, is ridiculous. No murder investigation team in the country would allow the dog, followed by Alice, right through the house and up several staircases, into the room where the murder victim lay. It is too silly and far fetched.
Having read to 30% this book will be a DNF for this reader.
My thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for my advance copy of this book.

Alice Beeton, distant relative of that Mrs Beeton, runs the Good Housekeeping Management Agency providing high class domestic staff to high class customers. One of her top clients calls in urgent need of a new housekeeper near. Christmas. Alice sends off a fairly new recruit. Only trouble is Enya is found dead at the property on New Years Day. The police do t seem to be getting anywhere so Alice decides to give them a hand. And she’s good at it! And I loved it. I hope it’s the first of many

Thanks Netgalley and the Publisher. Loved this book loved all the characters and the storyline, would highly recommend to other readers.

Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. All opinions are my own.

Definitely a book set up for a sequel or series. As any cozy mysteries like this go, it's glorifying readers who want to be in peace. Rather expectant interactions yet charming.

On the whole I enjoyed this book, with just a couple of reservations.

Miss Alice Beeton runs the Good Household Management Agency with her best friend Jinx, who she has known since boarding school, they run a very discreet agency placing staff when needed.

A few days before Christmas Alice is contacted by a personal assistant desperate to get a housekeeper in time for the Christmas period for a wealthy family consisting of art gallery owner father, chairty supporting mother and the archetypal goth daughter. Coincidentally at the same time, she is interviewing a lady called Enya Fischer who would be just perfect for the job.

All goes well until Alice receives a phone call on New Year's Eve stating that Enya has been found dead.

Definitely a cozy crime, a little wordy and drawn out in parts, also random recipes (Aice is a relative of the original Mrs Beeton) that aren't formatted properly at all and took ages to get past on the kindle, literally a word or two a page.

I would probably read another one just to give it a chance.

Loved this book. I own a Mrs Beetins cook book and loved this link! A well written story which I throughly enjoyed!

A cosy crime read.
Alice runs a household agency providing staff to well to do households, when one of her new staff Enya is found murdered. So Alice decides to investigate what happened to Enya by pretending to be a housekeeper in the house Enya was murdered.
Alice and her friends grow on you and are some good characters, but it did take a while to get into the story.
Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for the ARC and I give my honest review.

This is just a perfect, cosy mystery for christmas time (it’s definitely one I will be gifting to a couple of mystery lovers I know in their stockings)

Its slow and steady - which i really felt suited the whole tone of this read but definitely don’t go into this if you're wanting action packed, fast paced page turner. To me, the pacing and the atmosphere is perfectly curated to create a story that wraps you up.

The characters all felt nuanced and developed - such a rarity at the moment. Even smaller side characters felt ‘real’ and I loved seeing all the different friendship dynamics unfold. I’m not sure if further books are planned featuring Miss Beeton but I could absolutely see there being some follow up books and this becoming a series as there’s so much potential here!

In terms of the recipe inclusions - I have noticed this becoming a bit of a trend in cosy-themed books recently and honestly I don’t get it? When am I ever going to dig out a mystery book for a recipe? I end up entirely skipping over them as they add absolutely nothing but distraction. I’m desperately hoping this fad of randomly inserting recipes in novel dies off soon.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an E-ARC

I love finding a new author especially when the book is so enjoyable from the beginning. A cosy mystery type book in the style of Miss Marple I couldn’t wait to find out what would happen next. I just loved Alice and Agatha and the bother they seemed to find themselves in unwittingly. I really hope there is some more in this great series. The only thing I would say is the recipes need a bit of an edit as they were impossible to read. Other than that a brilliant book.

Overall, I enjoyed it! A cosy mystery, a hint of romance, Agatha!, friendship, and quite an adventure for Alice Beeton of the Good Household Management Agency. It was hard to get into it for the first eighty-six pages because nothing was really happening in relation to the main storyline. Clearly, something suspicious was going on with the new housekeeper and her new employers, but then the reader is veered away from the mystery to Alice’s family dinner that only distracts from the main events. Jasper’s character was extremely obnoxious and how had he been running Hawthorne for decades? Had it always been Alice? I felt bad for her for having to put up with him.
Recipes - I could see what the author was doing but I didn’t really read them as they too distracted from the plot. There were a few scenes where it felt like they were written solely to include a recipe.
Gerda’s character - that revelation felt a little too surreal, but in the end I was glad she was who she said she was.
Also, look out for the typos like
P259: Thérèse addresses Alice as Alice, not Caroline.
P333: Alice thinks about how she left the detective a voice note for him to come over to Hawthorn, but on p331 she told him to come to Hawthorn in person.
Thank you, HQ and Netgalley for this arc!

Oh, how I loved this book! A first class cosy mystery where our leading lady Miss Alice Beeton and her cluster of lovable friends can’t help but involve themselves in trying to solve a murderous crime that happens a little too close to home. Alice must go undercover into the world of an affluent family who may not be all they appear to be.
The plot kept me very immersed in the book, it was very intriguing and definitely a page turner. We have strong women, friendship and found family, not to mention a handsome detective and a very special dog called Agatha!