Murder Over Easy

Monona Quinn Mystery #1

by Marshall Cook

Monona Quinn thought moving away from the big city would be a refreshing change of pace. But when the owner of a popular local diner comes up murdered, she begins the hair-raising task of finding the culprit.

Genres: Mystery, Ebooks, Cozy Mystery, Fiction

184 pages, Hardcover

First published March 1, 2003

About the author

Marshall J. Cook taught for the University of Wisconsin-Madison for thirty years and often speaks at conferences nationwide. He has published several books on stress management and has even been a guest on Oprah to discuss the topic.
Marshall edits Extra Innings, an online newsletter for writers. He has authored thirty books and hundreds of magazine articles. Marshall holds his BA in creative writing and his MA in communications from Stanford University. He has been married to Ellen since 1968, and they have one son, Jeremiah. When not writing, Marshall likes to read, jog, lift weights, and talk back to the television (not all at the same time). He is a passionate minor league baseball fan, drives the back roads, and eats in small town cafes.

Reviews

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this story and will read more in the series. there is, however, something ameteurish about the storytelling's. the pot moves, the characters are developed but somehow it seems like an early attempt. as I said though, I will look for future books...it was a good story.

[Loraine · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this cozy mystery and had to laugh when the main characters would compare themselves to Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys.

[Dany · Rating 2 out of 5]

A diner owner in a small Wisconsin town dies and Mo Quinn, the editor of one the local newspaper does not think this was just an accident and is determined to find the killer.

I did not like this book. I couldn't find anything interesting about any of the characters presented. This hadn't happened to me in a long time, but I honestly didn't care about any of the characters, not a single one of them.

I found the mystery to be boring, there were too many random situations that added nothing to the plot and the sex scenes (in a cozy mystery!) felt completely out of place. However, what I disliked the most is something that constitutes a spoiler, so click below only if you don't mind spoilers:

Everyone knew the main character was gay so it was "no surprise" when some of them found out he had sexually abused a kid a few years ago. Being gay does not equal sexual abuse and stating otherwise is just blatant ignorance. Sexual abuse has nothing to do with being homosexual, bisexual or heterosexual. Also, even if we decide to ignore that offensive part, it just astonished me that after everyone found out he had tried to abuse another kid, they all still though he was a great guy! It made absolutely no sense.

So, in short, for me this was a one star book and I will not continue with the series.

[Kamas Kirian · Rating 1 out of 5]

A short little novel, more like a novella really, about the murder of a beloved diner owner and civic volunteer in a small Wisconsin town. Overall, I'm not a fan. It wasn't all that compelling reading. There were too many little things that just kinda nagged at me. Like: a whole, whole lot of the book was told as dialogue, and with the way it was formatted (both parties sentences in the same paragraph) it became annoying to read. Some of the storyline was so clearly foreshadowed that it could just as well have been printed in safety orange with a sign 'here be a clue'. None of the characters was all that well developed, more like quirky traits identified. I don't think I'll be reading any more works from this author, even if they are offered for free. It's just not worth my time.

The ebook was formatted OK, but there were several spelling errors and the paragraph structure was somewhat jumbled.

[Mercedes Cordero · Rating 1 out of 5]

Pretty bad. It was too predictable, not at all suspenseful or intriguing, and the characters were, sadly, very stereotyped and not likable, at least not enough to root for them or to care about them and their problems. There was even a semi-erotic scene that is most definitely out of place in a cozy murder mystery; completely unexpected and unnecessary.

[Chrissy Hale · Rating 2 out of 5]

I did not like this book. Bring that this is the first book of the series, there should have been some background information on the characters. There was none. You had to guess who each person was and how they were connected.

You are not informed on where each character is. For example, Mo was at the newspaper office then all of a sudden she’s at home in the same paragraph.

The book starts out at a funeral. No other info given. You have to guess

The best part of this book is when the town I live in is mentioned.

This author is a writing professor at a major university. How, I have no idea. I hope he teaches better than he writes

[Annalee Hoover · Rating 2 out of 5]

First of all, this is NOT A COZY! I'm not a prude, I know people (in books) have sex and that's fine. Except that I'm listening to the book, out loud, at work. I choose cozies for work so I dont have to worry about what might play.

I might have even forgiven the descriptive sex scene (not graphic, just detailed) if the story was better. It really wasnt that great. I'm not motivated to try to find the rest of the series and I understand why my library doesnt have any more than this one.

[Nancy Bennett · Rating 3 out of 5]

For about the first 2/3rds of this book I only thought it was so-so and almost decided to not complete it, but something turned around for me at the end and I ended up liking it enough for a 3-star. There wasn't anything *specific*, it just wasn't doing it for me. I'm glad I decided to keep going.

[Cathie Murphy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book. I really enjoyed the plot and the storyline. It was suspenseful. This is the best book this author has written. It stayed focused on the murder and kept me engaged the entire time I was reading it. It had lots of possible suspects. The characters were well developed and easy to follow. Highly recommend.

[Karen Potts · Rating 2 out of 5]

A light crime story that moves right along, presenting nothing deep in plot or characters.

[Theresa Lange · Rating 5 out of 5]

I liked this one!

[Michelle Seckinger · Rating 4 out of 5]

My only critique is that some of the dialogue was hard to read due to the way the conversations were written going on the same line, rather than separate lines per character

[Eileen Patterson · Rating 2 out of 5]

SPOILER ALERT

I enjoyed the mystery here and it would be a fun little cozy mystery if the characters didn't keep equating "gay" to "forcing teenage boys to have sex." The word "gay" is not synonymous with the word "predator" no matter what some people will tell you, there are plenty of gay people who don't abuse kids and teenagers, and this annoying aspect soured the whole book for me.

The mystery itself is fun. Not a big fan of the main character's husband, as he tends to treat her like a little kid, but otherwise, I enjoyed watching her pieces together the clues and figure out what happened. The attitude toward the deceased, though, that kept sticking in my craw whenever I tried to enjoy the book. It's all over the place. On one hand, everyone in the town seems to love him, he's been a foixture in the community for years, on the other hand, it's hinted that no one in the town would accept him if it came to light that he were gay, and then they kept throwing in that he abused teenage boys on the wrestling team and I kept wanting to scream "THAT MAKES HIM AN ABUSER NOT ALL GAY PEOPLE ARE ABUSERS STOP SAYING THAT." I wish I could giver this book a higher rating, but I just can't.

[Marcia Lechleitner · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fast read and full of mystery.

[Mom · Rating 4 out of 5]

Charlie was liked by everyone in town. He was into everything going on. But he was killed. Who would do that to him. They tried to make it look like he had fallen down the basement steps.
I like how Mo would not believe the murder had been solved.
Coach Hopkins was the one that knew Charlie had put the moves on one of "his boys". Now he had repeated the same thing on yet another kid. The coach did not like how Mo had figured it out he had killed Charlie.
She had found the splattering seeds around in the sub basement. She knew who did it.
It was good that Doug came by to check on Mo on the night he had baseball practice.
What an ending.

[Jenn · Rating 2 out of 5]

Gym reading (aka free or super cheap Kindle books). I like cozy mysteries. Generally there's a female "hero" who bumbles around and makes stupid decisions and there's a cast of kooky small town characters. This felt like it was supposed to be a cozy. It took place in a small town. But there weren't really any kooky characters. No one was really that interesting. The characters all felt stilted and one dimensional. The mystery was rather boring and lacked many real twists and turns. At one point, I decided to just give up, feeling like I was only a little ways into this one, but my Kindle said I was already at 60%, so I kept on. It WAS a quick (or short) read.

[Elizabeth · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a very quick read about a diner owner in the Madison, WI area who is found dead at the bottom of the stairs in his diner. The local weekly newspaper reporter gets a glimpse into the diner and notices that his white aprons are hung neatly along the staircase. If a man tripped and started falling down the stairs he'd probably grab at something, namely those aprons. Therefore she decides he was murdered, and the police aren't sharing info. There is very little depth to this book but it was a good escape during a rain storm.

[Melissainau · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a freebie from the Kindle store. The pacing felt off, the sex scenes inappropriate in what seemed to be billed as a cosy mystery, and the details of the protagonists' lives never made me care about them. Also, the insistence that the protagonist was such a great guy seemed misplaced, to put it mildly. I often get through two cosies in an evening but this took me about a month to get through Not recommended, even for free.

[Leigh Mitchell · Rating 2 out of 5]

A quick read but it was easy to work out whodunnit. Not the best I have read, needs an editor to look over it as with the dialogue it was difficult to tell who was saying what. The "erotic" scene in chapter 2 as mentioned by another reviewer is not as bad as she makes it out to be. The murder motive was a bit uncomfortable - the deceased is murdered because he turns out to be gay and also abuses teenage boys

[Elizabeth Love · Rating 3 out of 5]

Murder Over Easy is an okay cozy mystery. The story of the mystery is however, dark and not so cozy at all. It's a cliche journalist doing the investigating. That's not a bad thing but it's done to death just as characters married to cops are. I wanted to give a new author a chance and this wasn't enough to hook me on the characters or environment enough to get me addicted.

[Angie · Rating 2 out of 5]

I liked the title and the cover ...the story was just okay . Sigh .
There seemed to be a huge number of characters in the beginning , which is sometimes difficult for me to keep track of . The story soon became a quick & easy read , but also a little shallow with way too many side stories going on . Not bad ...just okay.

[Gillian · Rating 2 out of 5]

So far it's mediocre writing. I was expecting a cozy mystery, and did not expect the erotic scene in the middle of chapter two. I'll have to re-read some of the reviews I saw before "purchasing" this free book for my Nook to see if anyone else commented on this. That took the phrase "cozy mystery" to a whole different level.

[Kathi · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an awfully active town, given that the population is < 2000, but still plausible. I figured out some of the mystery before the end. Good enough for me to read some other Monona Quinn mysteries.

[Dee Renee Chesnut · Rating 1 out of 5]

This was a free ebook I downloaded from Barnes and Noble to my Nook. It could have been a mildly entertaining cozy mystery. However, I was annoyed by the many formatting errors that included entire conversations written in a single paragraph. I do not recommend it to anyone.

[Skeeter Jorgensen · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good cozy mystery. I liked it very much. Kept me guessing until the end. Mo, the editor of a small town newspaper in Wisconsin, tries to solve a murder of a well liked owner of the local diner. First there is no suspects then there are lots of them. A good fast read.

[Marilyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked this book. It was a small town mystery and had the usual quirky characters. The characters were well played and the mystery was like an old movie thriller. Thought I had it figured out, but it did a little turn on me. It was a good short read.

[Crys Bauermeister · Rating 2 out of 5]

Really slow starting book. Picked up by about half way through. Big city girl who moves to a small town & tries to solve a murder--way too trite of a plot line. Does wrap itself up nicely but a bit too much of a lead into a potential next book.

[Jeffrey · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked the story, but the book really needed an editor (or at least one that knew what they were doing.) Granted a lot of it could have been formatting issues with the ebook, at least that is what I am hoping. Even given that, there are parts that really, really needed a transition.

[Roberta (Always Behind) · Rating 3 out of 5]

I listened to the audio book. It kept me amused while driving around.The narrator was very good. The cosy mystery was just ok. I got this as a free download from my library so I did not have high expectations.

[David Rank · Rating 4 out of 5]

A smooth cozy murder mystery with well drawn out characters.