Review: A Death in Door County by Annelise Ryan

by Joli
A Death in Door County Book Review

I finished A Death in Door County by Annelise Ryan weeks ago, and I’m still thinking about how much I liked it! Read on for my full review of this super fun mystery.

The Summary

Morgan Carter, owner of the Odds and Ends bookstore in Door County, Wisconsin, has a hobby. When sheโ€™s not tending the store, sheโ€™s hunting cryptidsโ€”creatures whose existence is rumored, but never proven to be real. Itโ€™s a hobby that cost her parents their lives, but one sheโ€™ll never give up on.

So when a number of bodies turn up on the shores of Lake Michigan with injuries that look like bites from a giant unknown animal, police chief Jon Flanders turns to Morgan for help. A skeptic at heart, Morgan canโ€™t turn down the opportunity to find proof of an entity whose existence she canโ€™t definitively rule out. She and her beloved rescue dog, Newt, journey to the Death’s Door strait to hunt for a homicidal monster in the lakeโ€”but if theyโ€™re not careful, they just might be its next victims.

My Review

Although I don’t usually pick up mystery on my own, my home state is Wisconsin, so when I saw Door County mentioned in the title of the book, I had to read about it! The description really pulled me in, with the whole maybe there’s a homicidal monster, maybe there’s not thing. I’m a huge fan of the Great Lakes (I vacation on Lake Superior all the time), so imagining hunting Nessie in one of the Great Lakes was really fun and intriguing!

I knew from the get-go that I liked Morgan. She’s such a cool protagonist, with her bookstore full of all sorts of off-the-beaten-trail kinds of things (and books). She’s a strong woman who knows what she wants and what she likes, and she’s not going to take a bunch of crap.

When Jon shows up, I really wasn’t sure what to think of him. He’s just a quiet guy living a seemingly quiet life, and we don’t learn a ton about him. Turns out, that’s kind of key to the story later, so looking back I’m okay with it, but at the time was a little cold on him. I did grow to like him more, though.

The mystery part of this book is what made me like it so much. I loved that there’s a sci-fi element to it a bit, with the “is it a monster or not” bit. I did unfortunately call the mystery not too far into their investigation, but I definitely didn’t get the how or the who exactly, so it was still exciting to read.

There’s also some suspense when Morgan gets caught up a little too far into the mystery, which was also a fun read.

The only thing I wasn’t too sure about was the (very light) romance between Morgan and Jon. The attraction was fine and I liked when they came clean about their traumatic pasts, but I wished somewhat that they just became friends with a hint of maybe something romantic, instead of trying to make it happen within the story.

Overall, I really enjoyed A Death in Door County and I’m hoping for a series, since it’s marked as Monster Hunter Mystery #1 on Goodreads! I’ll definitely be reading any further books by Ryan. 4.5 stars.

Bookshop.org | Amazon | Goodreads

Joli

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