The Cruelest Month by Louise Penny is the third in the Three Pines/Inspector Armand Gamache mystery series. Clara and Peter, long suffering married artists join up with an Easter seance in the Old Hadley house. Of course someone related to that event ends up dead again. In the vein of The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson (1959), "it's the house!" Does every single book in this series have ties to that one house? http://pussreboots.com/blog/2020/comm... Rocky the squirrel

Things I love about this series, which became clear to me while reading this book: 1. Cozy mystery: none of that torture-porn bullshit that passes for mystery books these days 2. Solvable mystery: the clues are there, but so are the red herrings, so watch out! 3. Food porn: the food and drinks are described in such lush detail that it makes me swoon 4. Fantasy village: this place is like catnip to people like me There are really three plot lines in this novel, continuing on from the previous two novels, and I think that the two minor ones are almost as compelling as the main plot. As they say in the Strange Planet comic, "The being is fictional, my anger is real."

I have loved all of the Chief Inspector Gamache books, and this was no exception. I like how Louise Penny continues the character development across the books. You learn a little bit more about the characters. After reading The Cruelest Month, I like Ruth a lot more, and Peter a lot less. I'm eager to start the next book in the series.

4.5 stars Love this series. I want to live in Three Pines - and the food! These books make me soo hungry when I read them. At the heart of this series is a study of human nature: the great, the good, the bad, ugly and evil. The only imperfection of this book was the betrayal (trying not to spoil) it seemed to come out of nowhere with no reason and while it was explained at the end it was irritating up until that point, to be told at the end instead of shown.