About the Author

Blue Christmas is the third book of Weezie and Bebe mystery series. Kathy Hogan Trocheck writes under the popular pen name, Mary Kay Andrews. Before she became a full-time author, she worked as a journalist. She adopted the name, Mary Kay Andrews with the book Savannah blues which marked the beginning of her southern style books.

Synopsis

Weezie Foley runs an antique store in the Savannah district. She is all set to participate in the annual Christmas decorating contest, a week before Christmas day. After some sabotage, on the judgment day, Weezie comes up with a unique Christmas theme for her shop window – A Blue Christmas. And then things disappear mysteriously around Weezie starting with her 1950’s blue Christmas pin and gets quite interesting during the holiday season. Weezie is all set to enjoy the festive season but there is one thing that bothers her, the Christmas blues of her boyfriend Daniel.

Will Weezie win the contest? Will she get Daniel to embrace the spirit of the season? And what is all with the mysterious disappearance of stuff?

My thoughts

• Narrative and plot

I listened to the audiobook and it completely gets you in the mood with some gentle music at the beginning of a chapter and the southern accent. The heavy influence of Elvis Presley music is an added bonus if you are a music lover.

However, the plot was not as engaging as I thought it would be. Once again, I was unaware that this is the third book in a series. I never felt the need to know the back story of each character. It didn’t affect the plot in any way. Well, that is if the plot had been moving forward at all. It is supposed to be a light Christmas read with a bit of mystery. Even so, the first few chapters were needlessly elaborated while the rest of the book went in a rush.

• Characters and Conflict

Well, I mentioned the first part of the story was needlessly elaborated. However, while reading I enjoyed the first half more than the second half of the book. The conflict and mystery were set up nicely in the initial chapters. The build-up had you turning the pages to find out what was happening. Only, in the end, it never fully developed and is reduced to a merely trivialized melodramatic story.

That being said, the book didn’t bore me. The characters were mostly distinct, some clichéd but still had life in them. No one was one-dimensional and I enjoy it when every single character gets their own space. The only problem is the story took a turn to the clichéd territory and all that development was contained in that little circle of holiday drama.

•  Conclusion

Still, the book had its good moments. Even the drama was enjoyable. After all, holidays are the time for family drama even though in a mellowed manner and not as eccentric as in the book. I liked the eccentricity though. It was only how it trivialized the mystery element into a forced warmth had me disappointed. Especially when I was so intrigued by the title and cover of the book.

Get your book here :

Amazon_IN , Book Depository

Goodreads

Blue Christmas by Mary Kay Andrews
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

View all my reviews