The Body in the Annex

Sunset Lodge Mystery #1

by Diana Xarissa

After months of planning, sisters Abigail and Amanda Clark have finally purchased a historic resort property in the Finger Lakes. Abigail has years of experience managing hotels and restaurants, so she’s sure she’s ready for this new challenge. She isn’t even bothered when her sister takes her dream job and decides not to move to Nightshade right away.

When a guest turns up dead in one of the rooms, though, Abigail finds herself caught up in the middle of a murder investigation. That definitely wasn’t in her plans.

The dead man had a lot of enemies in the small town of Nightshade, New York, and it isn’t long before Abigail has met several of them. Her nosy neighbor is eager to poke her nose into the police investigation, but all Abigail wants to do is find some guests for Sunset Lodge.

Can Abigail fix up the historic hotel on a shoestring budget? Will she be able to find guests who don’t mind that a man was murdered in the hotel’s annex? Or will Abigail’s neighbor say the wrong thing to the wrong person and get someone else murdered before the police find the killer?

Genres: Mystery, Cozy Mystery, Cozy, Mystery Thriller, Amazon, Ebooks, Fiction

208 pages, Kindle Edition

First published July 28, 2022

About the author

Diana started self-publishing in 2013 and over a decade later she now has over a hundred books available for readers. Writing remains her passion and she has no plans to stop writing in the foreseeable future.

Diana grew up in Erie, Pennsylvania, and earned a history degree from Allegheny College. She met her husband, an Englishman, while living and working in Washington, DC. Following their marriage, she moved to Derbyshire. A short while later, the happy couple moved to the Isle of Man.

During their years on the island, Diana and her husband welcomed two children, and Diana completed a master’s degree in the history of the island. In 2008, the family made the decision to move to the US. Now empty-nesters, Diana and her husband are living in the suburbs of Buffalo, New York, and contemplating moving somewhere that doesn’t get snow.

Diana also writes mystery/thrillers set in the not-too-distant future as Diana X. Dunn and Young Adult fiction as D.X. Dunn.

Reviews

[Anne B Burn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not too sure about this one

This first book in a new series doesn't have the easy flow of other books. It's rather long winded and repetitive. The elderly lady, Jessica, seemed to wander in and chat about seemingly random events without any encouragement. The police presence was strangely low key, and the ending appeared in rather a rush. Perhaps book two will improve - if not, then this will be one I will not be reading.

[LORI CASWELL · Rating 3 out of 5]

Dollycas’s Thoughts

Sisters Abigail and Amanda Clark take a leap of faith and buy a historic resort in Nightshade, New York. Abigail has worked at and managed restaurants and hotels for years. Amanda is a set designer for off-Broadway shows in New York. Abigail knows the business and knows Amanda will devise unique ways to revamp the rooms and cabins.

Then Amanda has a great job offer she can’t pass up, so Abigail is on her own, but the resort’s employees have been working at the place for years so she knows together they can fulfill her plans.

Then Abigail finds her first guest dead in his room. She didn’t have a plan for that.

While she didn’t know the victim it seems the entire population of Nightshade did and no one had anything good to say about the man. Abigail’s retired neighbor Jessica knows everyone and she wants Abigail to investigate the murder but Abigail is confident the police will have an arrest soon. But soon all the people Jessica had mentioned as suspects make their way to visit Abigail and the Sunset Lodge. Could one of them be a murderer?

Abigail wants to concentrate on renovating the lodge but that darn Jessica wants to drag her into catching the killer, not understanding it could be the killer catching them.

I enjoyed meeting Abigail. She is learning that owning a hotel is different than managing a hotel. The buck now stops with her. In a change from a usual cozy mystery, she doesn’t want to investigate the murder. I was disappointed that her sister wasn’t as dedicated to the hotel as Abigail. While Abigail said she was okay with it, I was upset for her. Taking on this resort is a lot especially when you were supposed to have a partner. Jessica was a true nosy neighbor and a pushy one too. I liked the cook Marcia, handyman Carl, and night manager Arnold. They each have cabins on the property. They were loyal to the former owners and are ready, willing, and able to help Abigail make Sunset Lodge a place tourists would love. We also meet some Nightshade residents – most are murder suspects.

The victim, Russell Morris, left behind a slew of enemies. Several come by to introduce themselves to the new owner of Sunset Lodge but they all seem to have an agenda. Near the end, Jessica finally questioned people instead of just spouting theories. She was blunt which could have backfired. Abbi didn’t know any of these people so other than the body being found on her property she wasn’t invested in the investigation. What I did find surprising was that the victim’s major crime happened 10 years ago and nothing was done, something about contracts, but now the man has come back to town with another scam. The plot did have issues. I was able to hone in on the guilty party easily.

The Body in the Annex has given this series a good start. I liked Abigail and her employees and want to see the changes she has in store for the Sunset Lodge. I have enjoyed other books by this author so I know she can write a stronger mystery and there is a foundation here to build on, so I intend to continue with the series.

*This book was an Amazon Purchase.

[Klaus Yde · Rating 2 out of 5]

Rodet, usammenhængende og generelt dårligt sprog. Slet ikke på højde med hendes tidligere bøger.

[Stephanie Richmond · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another great cozy mystery series by Diana Xarissa

Another great cozy mystery series by Diana Xarissa. Looking forward to the next one, as always. Enjoyed the setting and the amateur sluething.

[Geordie · Rating 1 out of 5]

Abigail Clark and her sister have just bought the Sunset Lodge hotel, and now Abby is working to get it opened again so she can make enough money to stay in business. She has one early guest before a proper opening, and when she comes across his violently murdered body it turns her whole world upside down. She soon learns that the man was a con artist, despised by practically everyone in town, and now the whole town could be suspect in the murder.

As Abby tries to keep her hotel running and deals with the stresses of finding a dead body and a major police investigation she, to my surprise, doesn't do much else. I mean... that makes sense for a normal human being, but, to write a cozy mystery, the main character needs to be actively trying to solve the mystery. Abby didn't do a dang thing. Enter Jessica. Oh Jessica.... Jessica is a retired lady who walks into the hotel and tells her life story, her ENTIRE life story, over two chapters. She then proceeds to tell Abby all the details connected the original swindle and all the potential suspects living in town. So, this keeps Abigail from needing to do any investigating.... kind of? Because Abby goes on to meet all these characters later, so everything Jessica tells her is pretty much redundant! I don't know what the author was thinking here, maybe Jessica was her initial plan for a main character? She fills an absurdly large amount of the book, shoving her presence into Abby's life, and trying to force her to help investigate a mystery. Meanwhile Abby doesn't do a darned thing, and is all around lacking in personality and direction.

Jessica is the worst part of the book, but there're a lot of other weaknesses. Bland characters, guilting people we don't know, condemning someone for not feeling grief "correctly". The victim ran off with half a million dollars from scamming the town, but the police couldn't arrest him because he had such clever contracts with all his investors. That, and other places, felt like it was thought out by a junior high school student. Descriptions were lacking, and sometimes tepid ("in walked a 'very' handsome man...").

Ultimately a mediocre book with a lot of weird authorial choices goes completely off the rails as Abby is a witness to someone else solving the mystery. Yep.... was she supposed to be the Watson to Jessica's Holmes? Because she is, ostensibly, the main character, but was barely involved in the solution to the mystery. WHY the heck would you write a mystery that way? For that matter, Jessica doesn't do much to solve the mystery either! She just brow-beats her favorite suspect until that suspect blurts out something stupidly incriminating.

I can't stand mysteries where the protagonist doesn't do anything of any significance. Jessica's relevance to the plot was baffling, I don't know why the author felt this was the way to go, I certainly don't think Jessica was supposed to be the "hero" of the story, since she was grating and did no investigation, just made guesses constantly.

Just plain weird book, where the main character did practically nothing, and a little old lady jumped in out of nowhere to run her mouth and save the day.

[dnsyl57 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Abigail Clark has years of experience in hotel and restaurant management. Her sister Amanda studied technical theatre and design in university. Between them, they decide to fulfill a dream of owning a business together and purchase the historic Sunset Lodge in Nightshade New York. At the last minute, Amanda is offered a plum job in New York City, so Abigail is on her own for getting the Lodge refurbished.

She has kept on the three previous staff members to help her with the work. They aren't technically open for guests but one convinces Abigail to let him stay in a guest room in the annex behind the hotel. When she goes to clean the room the following day she is shocked to find the man has been murdered! He had seemed quite charming but she soon learns that almost everyone in town hated him - but which one hated him enough to commit such a violent act?

My thoughts:
This was a quick read with the focus of the story being on Abigail's attempts to bring the hotel up to date. Given her years of hotel management experience, I was a bit surprised at how little she seemed to have thought through some of the potential issues that the business could face, but I assume as a manager she wasn't as informed on some things as an actual owner.

The staff are more than willing to help with whatever work is needed and fill her in on the history of the dead man and some of the potential suspects in town. Then there is her elderly neighbor - Jessica Fleming (think a cross between Jessica Fletcher and Miss Marple) - who is quite keen to get all the information from Abigail, her staff and all the people she knows in town so she can puzzle out who did it.

There are only a handful of real suspects and some of those can't even really be considered as such but two stood out to me. (One of those turned out to be the killer). The detective seemed thorough but not overly inclined to share info.

The core characters worked fairly well together and there is potential for some interesting plot twists in future books.

[Ali · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Body in the Annex is the first in a cozy mystery series about a woman who has bought a rundown lodge in the Finger Lakes region of New York. The hotel is more or less closed for renovation, but Abigail, the main character, reluctantly rents a room to a traveler, only to find him dead the next morning and to discover that he is one of the most hated men in her new town.

The first book in a cozy mystery series can be tricky. The author creates a small town and its citizens, introduces a main character and key side characters, establishes the business/hobby/craft the series is built around, and creates an interesting mystery. Xarissa has a lot of experience, but I feel like this story's pacing was affected by too many characters squeezed into too few pages, and the author made an unusual choice in how the mystery was solved that didn't really hit for me.

I did like Abigail, the main character. She was rational, experienced enough to make her business venture believable, and not afraid to stand her ground. I also liked the setting. Although we spent most of our time at the Lodge, it felt like it was part of an existing town, and that's important in a cozy. However, there were too many characters for such a short book, and too many of them were suspects. Jessica, the neighbor, filled a strange role. Like Basil Exposition in Austin Powers, she shows up and word vomits years' worth of character information and gossip, pages of boring exposition. And as for her part in the ending...well, she was doing things I was expecting Abigail to do. It was strange.

My CAWPILE score for The Body in the Annex was 48, or 6.86 (3 stars).

[Voirrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

I can see this series being a good one - two sisters buy a lodge by a lake in New York State, but as the story begins Abigail is having to get to grips with this new business alone as her sister has been offered an unexpected dream job back in the city.

So we have Abigail trying to find her feet and meet all her staff, which introduces them all to us, of course. then an unexpected guest asks for a room - and even if not officially open, a paying guest is not someone to turn away. Shame he doesn't check out because he didn't survive the stay.

The cast of characters is now swelled with the local police department and an elderly neighbour who reckons she is more likely to solve the crime than they are.

As the story progresses we meet a lot more of the locals - including one we are not going to see in the rest of the series, of course!

As a regular reader of Diana's books I enjoyed the fun she has with names across the different series. I'm sure other readers will have as much fun spotting them -but here is just one; in her books set on the Isle-of-Man there is a local reporter called Dan Ross; and in Nightshade we have one Ross Danielson...

The motive for the murder was interesting - but the new cast of characters were even more interesting and I can see the series being a good read 👍👍

[Ann · Rating 3 out of 5]

As the first in a series there is a lot of introduction of character and place. At first it felt a bit disjointed and there was a lot of dialogue by the gossipy, but obviously astute, neighbor clearly designed purely to introduce people. Still, I suppose that's better than just putting it out as part of the narrative.

There wasn't a whole lot of detecting and the mystery wasn't vary meaty. And there was at least one question left completely unanswered, namely, why is everyone so interested in the hotel annex building. Though I suppose the various explanations given could be taken at face value.

In short, it was a quick read (the kindle files ends at the 88% mark; the rest is previews of the next in the series), light and reasonably enjoyable. I'm not sure if I'll be continuing or not.

[Rebecca Gregory-Chifos · Rating 4 out of 5]

Always Enjoy Diana Xarissa's Books!

As a hardcore fan of the "Aunt Bessie" books, I always enjoy Diana Xarissa's books. They are always well-written and a quick but entertaining read. That being said, this first in a new series was a bit vanilla-flavored. I did enjoy the fact that the main character, Abigail, is actually the Dr. Watson, not the Sherlock Holmes. I also liked the coziness of the relationships of Abigail and all the employees whom she's kept on after purchasing the hotel. Still, the plot seemed to have a few holes--especially the fact that, after 10 years, no one has ever found, sued, or arrested the conman. The police presence and investigation also seemed like an afterthought.

Nevertheless, I will probably continue with the series, because I did enjoy the book, plot problems notwithstanding.

[Larry · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was disappointed with this story. The main character is the new owner of the Sunset Lodge and she and her sister bought the Lodge and sank all the earnings into it, They kept all the current employees and were planning to repair most of the rooms as well as paint them and repair all the minor leaks and problems an establishment tends to accumulate over the years. There is great potential here. A murder is found, and later a new character is introduced, a "Jessica Fleming" and in my personal opinion, the story tanked from her introduction on. I was disappointed with the outcome and had several questions left unanswered. However, I am not a published author and probably never will be, so read the story for yourselves and decide for yourselves if you like it. The story does have several 5 star reviews.

[Sookies Reads · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great start to a new series

I wanted to read this book because it was centered around the region where I lived. The more I read, the better it got. This book was compelling, fast paced with a cast of interesting characters. Abigail and Mandy are two sisters from NYC who decide to buy the Sunset Lodge in the Finger Lakes region. Abigail is in charge of the hotel as Mandy stays in the city for work. One day, as Abbi is preparing to clean the room of the Lodges lone guest, she finds his dead body. Together with her Co workers and her older, cozy mystery addicted neighbor, Abbi sets out to bring the Sunset Lodge to life once again, they just may solve a murder. This is a guaranteed fun read that will leave you guessing until the end.

[Linda · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading The Body on the Annex. Abigail and her sister recently became the owners of the Sunset Lodge in the small town of Nightshade. They've kept the previous workers--Marcia Burton, cook; Carl Young, handyman; and Arnold Nagel, night manager. They aren't open for business but Abigail allows one guest, Rusty Morris, to check in. Unfortunately he doesn't check out. Abigail discovers him dead when she goes to clean his room. Detective Fred Williams is soon on the case. Jessica Fleming, the lodge's neighbor, introduces herself and is a fountain of information. I liked this story and the characters. There were twists and turns and Rusty's background factored into his death. I look forward to seeing how things go with the Sunset Lodge.

[Linda · Rating 5 out of 5]

Abigail Clark and her younger sister, Amanda, have recently purchased the Sunset Lodge in Nightshade, New York, consisting of a main building, an annex, and four cottages.

Thinking that a guest has already left, Abigail enters a room in the annex to do housekeeping. When she sees a bloody body on the bed, she quickly calls the local police.

The victim, Russell Morris, has a history in Nightshade. Ten years previously, he swindled many of the residents of the town, leaving with about half a million dollars. There is no shortage of people with motives ... including, apparently, even Abigail herself.

[Tari · Rating 5 out of 5]

I saw the latest book in this series announced in someone’s blog, so naturally I wanted to start from the beginning. I liked how Abigail put family first in wanting to let her sister take some jobs in the city she really wanted instead of coming to help her at the resort.

I really enjoyed Jessica’s character and how good she was at grilling suspects lol. She reminded me of everyone’s beloved Jessica from TV. I liked Carl, Marcia and Arnold’s characters a lot too and could tell they’d be just as supportive of their new boss as they were the former owners. Can’t wait to borrow and read the next book since there was a little preview was given at the end of this book.

[The Poisoned Pen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm not really sure how I feel about this book.

It was quite slow at times, and the characters lacked depth. I just didn't feel a connection to them.

I do find it interesting that the main character is NOT the amateur sleuth in this series. The character playing the nosy sleuth seems to be a version of Jessica Fletcher from Murder She Wrote.

Unfortunately this book didn't engage me much. I'm willing to give book 2 a try, but I may not read past that.

I just wish the characters and story had come to life more in book 1.

Also - who sits down with a stranger and starts exposing secrets of the entire town to them?? Not very realistic or respectable.

[Therese · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good Firstmin Series

Abigail is the new owner and manager of Sunset Lodge. A murder occurs, and her neighbor helps her work through the long list of suspects to come up with the murderer's name.
And all because the police detective has never had a murder case before this one.
I look forward to following the development of the series!

[Michelle Knight · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nice cozy mystery

I really liked this new to me book by the author of the Aunt Bessie books. I like the way the author scrambled the names of some of the characters from the Aunt Bessie stories for the names of some of the characters mentioned in this book. It was a cute little Easter egg.

[Becca · Rating 3 out of 5]

I got this as a free e-book and thought it sounded interesting. It was an alright story but I felt it didn't really go anywhere and none of the characters really developed. It felt quite flat as a book and I didn't really get into it. Maybe future books in this series might see more development, I don't know.

[Lesley Hewitt · Rating 5 out of 5]

A nice cozy murder mystery

It took me a while to get into this book. I persevered with it and read it all. I think I will have to read the next book before I decide whether I like these characters or not. I have five stars as it started to get better in the last few chapters.

[L Kate · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really good mystery.

A very good first novel for a new series, with a really good mystery and a few well defined characters. Not that this is any surprise since we’ve already had several series by this author to introduce us to her enjoyable writing style.

[Serina · Rating 4 out of 5]

the annex

Love this new series. The main character, Abigail needs to season for a bit. The mystery was good, the side characters are interesting and I see some really great mysteries coming.

[Kasey Riley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just what I needed…

I spent an hour combing through “cozy mysteries” before I found this book. I’m happy I kept looking. It’s a great start for a series. The characters are realistic and likable while the setting is perfect for this plot. Great job!

[Charline Romine · Rating 4 out of 5]

OK Cozy

Fifteen chapters of interesting cozy mystery. The older neighbor across the road is the mystery solver. The new owner of the lodge was tending to business.

[Lizabeth Tarr · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great read

This is a great start in a new series, with interesting characters and room for growth in relationships and friendships! Also, a great mystery, too!

[A G A VAN DEN BOS · Rating 1 out of 5]

Asinine

[Elisabeth · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pretty good tale

An enjoyable read, if not terrifically deep. I enjoyed it and will read the next one. it is somewhat formulaic.

[Elainebowden · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful

A wonderful new series can't wait to read the next ones to see how the characters develop and grow over the next few books .

[Alyce Perry · Rating 3 out of 5]

Meh!! I will try the second but! Doesn't have the charm and liveliness of the Aunt Bessie and Mona books.

[Sandra Crater · Rating 5 out of 5]

surprise, surprise

There were many twists and turns and you are kept guessing till almost at the end and whatever happened to the pink paint?