Book Review: Dying for a Date

Dying for a Date, by Cindy Sample

• Paperback: 272 pages
• Publisher: L & L Dreamspell (June 10, 2010)
• ISBN-10: 1603182489
• Rating (1 to 5 *): *****

Book Review: Dying for a Date, by Cindy Sample

Laurel McKay isn't exactly what many men consider an ideal date. She's divorced, the mother of two kids, and her dates keep showing up dead. When she is, quite naturally, considered to be the only suspect in the two cases that otherwise seem to have no connection, Laurel decides that she is her own best shot at proving her innocence by solving the murders herself.

Cindy Sample's debut novel is a hilarious romp, dragging the reader along with Laurel from humiliation at her kid's soccer game to a wake where she shouldn't be, and all over the gold country in the Sierra Nevada foothills in her pursuit of the truth. All the while, she is trying not to get fired from her job at the mortgage company and trying to keep her mother, who is trying to fix her up with a co-worker, off her back. Can Laurel find the murderer before she becomes the next victim--or before her mother drives her crazy?

Dying for a Date had me literally laughing out loud and guessing at the murderer, then changing my guess, then changing it again throughout the whole book. Although I thought the pacing dragged a bit through the middle of the story, it picked right up again toward the very exciting--and hilarious--conclusion. I found the characters charmingly approachable, the kind of people I would like to get to know better. I can't wait to read Sample's next book, Dying for a Dance.

Find out more about Cindy at http://cindysamplebooks.com/