Blog Tour - May Day Murder by Julie Wassmer

It's springtime and Whitstable is emerging from hibernation. While neither the restaurant nor detective agency is too busy, Pearl resolves to spend some time at the family allotment. But her best friend, Nathan, has persuaded one of his favourite actresses to open the May Day festivities at Whitstable Castle and involves Pearl in his plans. Like Pearl, Faye Marlowe is a Whitstable native, but having left the town more than two decades ago, the star has been living in the South of France since her agent's phone stopped ringing. Charming but 'sensitive', she arrives with a small entourage and though her presence in the town causes a stir Pearl's mother Dolly remains unimpressed, choosing to remember Faye Marlow when she was plain old Frankie Murray, the daughter of a local whelk merchant. Nathan soon realises he has made a mistake with this invitation and his doubts are confirmed when Faye is nowhere to be found on the morning of May Day. And as 'Jack in the Green' puts on his impressive costume to lead the parade, the actress's dead body is discovered - tethered to the maypole on the Castle grounds ...and so it's left to Pearl and DCI Mike McGuire to unravel the mystery of the May Day murder.

Publisher: Little, Brown Book Group
ISBN: 9781472118950

Today I welcome Pearl back to my blog as Julie Wassmer's third book in the Whitstable Pearl murders series is released in hardback. I previously hosted a blog tour for the second book in the series Murder on Sea in October.

The Whitstable Pearl Murder series is a great cosy crime series, similar to M C Beaton's Agatha Raisin and Rebecca Tope's  Thea Osborne Cotswold Mystery series.

I really enjoyed this book, travelling back to Whitstable, where actress Faye Marlow returns to home soil to open Whitstable Castle's May Day festivities. However the day doesn't go to plan as the actress's dead body is discovered. 

As many good series beforehand, the reader is able to catch up with Whitstable's familiar characters in the beautiful village setting. There are fantastic characters, my favourite continues to be Pearl's mum, Dolly. 

Julie's fantastic writing style allows the reader to loose themselves in Whitstable's village life and I would love to see this series made into a television series - Midsummer Murder's take two! Each book can be read as a stand alone, however I am sure readers will want to continue to revisit Whitstable once they have visited once.

I am already looking forward to my next visit to Whitstable.

Thank you to the author, Julie Wassmer, and the publishers, Little, Brown, for inviting me to take part in this blog tour.