Murder, She Wrote: Murder in Red by Jon Land

Murder, She Wrote: Murder in Red by Jessica Fletcher & Jon Land ISBN-13: 9780451489333 Hardback: 320 pages Publisher: Berkley Books Released: May 28, 2019

Source: review copy from the publisher.

Book Description, Modified from Goodreads:
Jessica Fletcher's favorite gin rummy partner, Mimi Van Dorn, has started going to Clifton Care Partners, a private hospital that's just opened up shop in town, for a anti-aging clinical trial--one that leads tragically to her death. On the trail of what initially appears to be medical malpractice, Jessica digs deeper and learns her friend was actually a victim of something far more sinister. Death is bad for business, but murder is even worse, and Jessica will find plenty of both as she races to bring down Clifton Care Partners before someone else flatlines...


My Review:
Murder in Red is a cozy mystery (#49 in the series). At first, this book seemed more like the earlier stories: friendly, nosy Jessica Fletcher asked questions about suspicious deaths and tracked down clues. But the new author has re-written some of the series history, like "J.B. Fletcher" is no longer Jessica's author name but the name of the heroine in her novels. The characters were closer to what I expected, but "smart" Jessica didn't catch on to some very obvious things. She also did some very illogical things to add suspense opportunities, like run after a man with a gun who'd just shot at her (and, no, she had no weapon).

Also, it was obvious who was involved in the murders and even the "surprise" twists. The only reason a reader can't figure out all the details is because some information is held back until Jessica explained everything. Other (critical) details made no sense if you think about them but you're just supposed to accept them. Finally, the author didn't know some basic things relevant to the story, like he has everyone in the story act like Type 2 Diabetes and pre-diabetes are the same thing and like Type 1 Diabetes is a worsening of Type 2 to the point of needing insulin (rather than an autoimmune disease).

There was no sex. There were a few uses of bad language.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.