Spelled in Ink: A hilarious paranormal cozy murder mystery and fantasy featuring a witty female amateur sleuth by Lina HansenMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
I always go on the alert when a book's blurb or, in this case, subtitle goes out of its way to emphasize how funny it is. It's like a second-hand car salesman calling himself "Honest John." And I was right to be cautious in this case; for me, at least, it never got beyond "very mildly amusing," and was never within a thousand miles of "hilarious," nor was the female amateur sleuth notably witty. But maybe I missed something.
Paranormal it is. Cozy... maybe? Someone enjoys a cup of tea at one point, I think. Fantasy, definitely; this is an alternate version of our world in which magic is not only real but publicly known about, though not much trusted, and (in some ill-defined way) starting to wane under the influence of technology. It appears that people who are called "mages," but described at one point as "magically challenged" (so in what sense are they "mages"?), are working to accelerate this shift, and that Leonardo da Vinci was - and perhaps still is - one of them. The worldbuilding is not well defined, and its relationship to the plot is more to provide convenience when needed than to drive events.
The plot itself is unexceptional, and I found the characters bland and generic. The mystery plot is not particularly a focus, and it gets resolved relatively easily, though in a way that leaves a big "why?" to be, presumably, discovered in future books. There are hints that there will be a slow-burn romance between the magic-using first-person narrator and the magic-distrusting academic/burglar, but very little advancement occurs in that subplot in this first book.
All in all, it didn't do much for me, and I was surprised to see the author's extensive list of awards for her other writing at the back of the book. It's mostly decently edited, at least, though with some vocabulary and tense issues (mostly missing past perfect, but some present tense that should be past). I will mention these to the publisher, and they may be fixed by publication.
I received a pre-publication copy via Netgalley for review.
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