Vampires and Villains

Magical Mystery Book Club Book 2

By: Elizabeth Pantley

Narrated by: Virtual Voice

Length: 6 hrs and 24 mins

Publisher's summary

When this club selects a book, magic happens. They become the main characters in the story when the mystery comes to life.

The club agrees on their monthly book. This one takes place on a cruise ship bound for Hawaii. Problem is, they were so excited about the cruising idea that they didn’t read the entire blurb on the back of the book.

Once on the ship, they meet a charming man who blends seamlessly into their motley group. Too bad they don’t know why he’s so scarce during the day but shows up to join them every evening for dinner, drinks, and a show.

When a dead body shows up on board, their new friend is labeled a suspect. Can they help him out by finding the real murderer? Or is he the real murderer? The book club will need to solve the case to get off the ship, out of the book, and back to their home.

"An absolutely ingenious idea for a mystery book!"
"Will carry you away!"
"You can't get enough of this series!"

You can’t go wrong finding yourself in a book with a vampire.

Listening to the audiobook just made this wonderful, fantasy book shine more. I admit, when I first started listening I wasn’t sure about the narrator, the voice seemed to lack warmth. As the book went on, I adjusted to the rhythm and tone and found myself enjoying the book immensely.

The second book in the series did not disappoint. A new member joins the book club as they find themselves inside a paranormal book and taking a cruise. It was interesting to do a paranormal plot as the club had to think outside the box to solve the mystery. I loved that Frank, the cat, was able to speak and be heard in this book by everyone. The new character, Million, was a great foil for Zell as they learned about each other. One of my favorite things about this series is how the characters of the book club all contribute some type of skill or plan for solving the murder. They are a misfit group, but have quickly become family. The plot was fun and interesting, and I love the way friendship is always a focus in the author’s books. She makes it very easy for the reader to feel as if they are part of the world they are reading.

My review is voluntary and all comments and opinions expressed are
my own.

Excellent mystery.

I’m really surprised at the realness of the virtual voice, sounds totally human! Excited to listen to the other books in this series.

Amazing and magical adventure!

I had read this book, but in listening to the audiobook, i was finding so many things that either I didn’t remember or missed noticing while reading! The digital voice was just right, the story, and did not have any awkward indications that it even was a digital voice, to the credit of the audiobook creation team
If it could be possible, listening to the book, felt as much or even more magical than having read it!

Once again, Elizabeth Pantley takes us on a magical journey with the book club, this time onto a cruise! with paranormal creatures, as evidence by the title, they mingle with vampires as both passengers and staff, even befriending some key staff members that ultimately help them with their investigation. Pantley’s glorious descriptions of the ship, the landscapes and locations, their rooms, the clothing, the buffets, and the people are as wonderful as ever, and definitely make you feel like you are there!
Always mystifying, Elizabeth, Pantley‘s mind has created something still a cozy mystery and yet completely different than the first book in the series as well as different from other cozy mysteries. Imagination and carefully crafted language in her writing just absolutely makes you feel like you are there!
As as often the case, we are educated, along with the book club about the reality versus myth and TV versions of vampires which makes the story even more intriguing… we are reading about real vampires not the made-up fictional versions.
There is romance, and friendship, and adventure, and events to participate in off the boat, plus the creepy suspected evil characters!
A boring ship photographer is found dead, and security keeps it kind of hushed, but we do find out that there are two perfectly spaced marks on his neck …so the hunt begins for a vampire, who has broken all the rules and attacked a human which they are not allowed to do even with a human’s permission, according to their code of ethics. The offending vampire, when found, will be removed from the ship and handed over to appropriate vampire authorities to be accountable for their actions.
They immediately come up with more than a few suspects or motives to investigate further. They team up with security, as is their way their journeys, to help finding the offender with the least knowledge of the shipgoers as possible, hoping, keeping it hushed.
The murder victim is discovered fairly early in the story, so we have a lot of time to ponder as readers as to who it might be, and the reasons why! As is, my usual, I pretty much don’t have a clue, almost until the end of the story because the creativity in weaving the tale keeps me guessing!!
There is a wild, unexpected turn shortly before the true identity of the assailant is discovered, and I won’t divulge that so the next listener can be just as surprised as I was!! One of the club members who was on this trip met a very good friend on the ship with whom to spend their life.
The book club returns to their library to go home by writing the end. I will eagerly anticipate jumping into their next book along with them.!!

High sea murder with a difference

I read this book when it first came out on my kindle and at the time I Just knew I would be adding it to my audio book library. . This is book two in the series and I am not normally a vampire fan (because frankly they are just creepy, the whole blood thing) but when one of your favourite author's decide to write about them and it's part of an unusual and fun series, then you have no choice but to jump on board. So glad I did, it almost felt like you were on board experiencing the adventure along with the characters. I love the whole plot idea for this series, that a group of quirky characters known collectively as the magical book club members actually get to solve the mystery from inside the book, as you can imagine this means that the author gets to write about new and exciting places, in situations where anything can happen. The authors imagination has once again been let lose to come up with unusual plot idea's. I have read and listened to a number of cozy mysteries set on cruise ships but never have they involved vampires, its a good job that they didn't dampen the experience of a trip to Hawaii. As long as the author is willing to keep writing I for one am willing to keep reading or going on the adventures.
With a new book club member joining them, Paige and her Aunt Glo hold another meeting. This time the group select a book on a cruise ship heading to Hawaii. The group get sucked into the cruise life before reading all the blurb and quickly forget that they are there to solve a murder. Until they stumble over a body with puncture marks in his neck and then certain things being to make sense. The head of security is quick to come up with a suspect list and at the top of the list is there new friend and dinner companion Vincent. Have they been spending time with the killer? There is only one way to find out and that is to get a look at the suspect list themselves and find the killer.
The AI narration has grown on me and while it didn't give you accents for the different characters, it was still easy to listen too and you could always tell which character was talking.

Great character communication examples for real life

"Vampires and Villains (Magical Mystery Book Club #2)" by Elizabeth Pantley takes the Magical Mystery Club into a cozy vampire cruise ship mystery. This book the characters are more established feeling, even the new guy seems to fit right in with little friction to the group. I like that, that's why I like cozy mysteries. People who should like each other should figure out ways to communicate and resolve their issues (should still do this even if you don't like each other too) and this series so far has done a good job of showing that happening.

The mystery part was a bit more involved on the part of the characters. Probably, in part, because the getting to know the characters happened more in the first book. I had an inkling that the culprit was who it ended up being but not really their motives until just before the reveal.

Fun cozy mystery!

Paige and her Aunt Glo are back in another book club mystery. This time they are on a cruise in the mystery book. The atmosphere of the story was fun! There was some humor and entertainment along the way. How involved are the vampires in the mystery? Paige and Glo are fun, and so are all of the other assorted interesting members of the book club. I listened to the audiobook and it was enjoyable and easy to listen to.

V&V Bk 2

I got this book because I liked the premise of falling into a book physically. While I'm not a huge fan of cozy mysteries I can't complain, since the series clearly identifies "cozy" but the series left me wanting more out of the story, I felt this series had loads of promise for it's idea's of travelling within the book - The character "Moonbeam" was totally redundant and in my opinion and brought the book down instead of adding a new dimension to the story line. Moonbeam also spends too much time minding other peoples business and wanting to correct their language and behaviour -
The virtual voice narrator still needs work, but it's one of the better virtual voice AI that I've listened to. The problem with virtual voice is that it lacks lilt and sarcasm, and idioms like "Tomato - Toe-mot-o" are lost on virtual voice, so it's difficult to feel part of the story in my opinion.