Murder of a Small-Town Honey

A Scumble River Mystery, Book 1

By: Denise Swanson

Narrated by: Christine Leto

Length: 7 hrs and 25 mins

Publisher's summary

When Skye Denison left Scumble River years ago, she swore she'd never return. But after a bout with her boyfriend and credit card rejection, she's back to home sweet - homicide....

©2000 Denise Swanson Stybr (P)2012 Audible, Inc.

Surprisingly Good

This was a good listen. I will buy Denise Swanson books again. The narrator was perfect! Very good cozy mystery.

Cute Beginning of a Fun Series

I have read several of the later books in this series. I finally got around to reading the first.

Full disclosure: I have read several of these books because I heard the author speak one time. She was a pure delight and I thought her books would be as enjoyable and entertaining as she was. I was not disappointed. Professionally, Skye Dennison is very much like Denise Swanson. The author said that when she started writing, some of her friends asked why she was writing mysteries instead of the very lucrative romances. She said in her years of school employment she had never met anyone she wanted to sleep with, but she met a lot of people she wanted to kill.

I also enjoyed Skye's discomfort of being the country mouse who moved to the big city but had to come back home, tail between her legs. A lot of people can relate to that.

I did not care for the reader's portrayal of Skye's mother. She sounded like the grandma in the Stephanie Plum series. Skye's mother is not that old.

Ms Swanson's writing is warm and funny. I like her characters, especially later in the series when they are fleshed out more. This book is a nice cozy mystery to read on a cold winter night by the fire.

Perfect Murder Mystery

Any additional comments?

Enjoyed the fact that you don't know who the murderer is before the end. So many suspects with motive. Christine Leto is easy to listen to and enjoyed her narration. Will be looking for more of her work. The main character is just quirky enough to keep you smiling. A light hearted story line.

blackmail

good read, the plot moved a long quickly. I thought next book was better in series. i thought was a 6 or two stars. I thought woman reading the book did a good job.

Second Time Around Still Rocks

This is my second time around. I first listened to this series two years ago. It is better than I remember. The characterization, setting, and plot lines draw the reader in and makes her/him a part of a family and a community that is not only believable but also relevant. With the ravages and restrictions of COVID ever looming, it is such a joy to become immersed in stories of the way “life” and living used to be.

Having a hard time making it through this

What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?

This book is seriously dragging on. Its spending so much time on small town drama and background information that there is no Mystery to this mystery

What was most disappointing about Denise Swanson’s story?

an actual mystery

How could the performance have been better?

i felt no connection to the chracters voices were drab

What character would you cut from Murder of a Small-Town Honey?

skye

Any additional comments?

don't download this book

Meh

After listening to twoC Beaton series in their entirety, I was looking for a new cozy series. This was not a great substitute. Narrator was like listening to my sister read to my niece- meaning amateur. I got spoiled by fine English narrators who could bring all the characters alive. The The story and character are meh also. I see there are many books in this series, I may try a later one to see if they got better but overall very so-so.

Worst Narrator on a not-very-good book

What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?

This reader was terrible. She was unable to develop interesting characters using her voice, and she was one of the slowest readers I've listened to...and I listen to a lot of books! In addition, there were many mispronounced words that were incredibly distracting from the book. (For example, pronounced the "s" on the end of Illinois).

Would you ever listen to anything by Denise Swanson again?

No, this book was all over the place. Included lots of extraneous scenes that did not build towards the murder mystery. It felt like it couldn't decide whether it wanted to be a murder mystery book or a novel about a very boring girl who moved back to her small town to live a very boring life.

Any additional comments?

DO NOT WASTE YOUR MONEY.

unacceptable production

The story is okay; not interesting enough for me to read another book in the series, but I'll finish this book. The narration (and probably some blame to the other production staff) is just unacceptable. I didn't know this author, so I previewed the first several pages as a Kindle book sample.

Therefore, I know for a fact that the narrator said "investigator" when the correct word was "instigator" within the first several pages of the book. Then shortly thereafter she said "debauchery" where that word made NO sense, but the word debacle would have made a lot of sense.

Really, nobody on the production staff helps with errors in reading the book, when their whole job is to record someone reading the words in the book?

Then she mispronounced the word indelible. Then there was yet another word problem (at least four mistakes within the first several chapters) that I can't even remember now. Plus she doesn't have any interesting voices. You can't even readily tell when she's reading words attributed to a man versus a woman.

Then I noticed her intermittent speech impediment. I went to several years of speech therapy, so I'm probably much more sensitive to hearing this stuff than others, and it is truly intermittent. Makes me wonder whether she has just a bit of a problem on the days when she's tired.

To sum up: the multitude of errors and the poor production (everyone listed in the credits is responsible for me/us hearing a recording of the words the author wrote) this just took the experience below acceptable. I expect an occasional error, because we're all human. But this one has problem after problem.

Disappointing

By the third chapter I got a sense the heroine was wishy washy, acting like a character in a 1970s Harlequin book. Then when the narrator pronounced Illinois with an S on the end, I was done.