Roadside Homicide (River Sutton Country Cozy Mysteries Book 1), by Nancy Basile

 I enjoyed this book. An interesting story combined with the weirdness many feel when coming home after a long time gone. Robin literally almost crashes into this mystery as the soon to be dead man stumbles out in front of her car. He's only able to mutter a few syllables before he dies but that is enough to make Robin, a computer search wiz, determined to find out not just who killed him but why. Along the way she encounters some blasts from the past, both good and bad. I had the wrong suspect pegged as the murderer, by the way, but it all made perfect sense at the end.

I liked Robin. Having been quite shy during my own high school days, more at home with my nose in a book than being social, I could relate. That made her ability to focus on finding long forgotten clues that tied two cases together make sense. She seemed to jump right into questioning people and pushing ahead when it might have been wiser to allow Chris, the local police and a former crush, to take the lead, of course. Will she get smarter and let him into her amateur investigation? Will Jenn's wedding come off with no more problems? Will Chris ever act on his long ago crush? Will Robin stay or will Robin go?

This book seemed to be a nice mesh of mystery and romance. Between Jenn's upcoming wedding (and I should probably note for any who care that it's a same sex wedding, in small town West Virginia, no less) and Robin discovering Chris' long ago crush, the mystery occasionally seems shoved into the background. That's actually good as, let's face it, even in real life investigations shouldn't focus our attention on finding the solution 24/7 but allow those involved to continue living, too. I liked that. On the downside, I made an early note to myself saying, "Will what's in her suitcase matter?" as I read the great detail given to that aspect of Robin's trip back to her ol' home town. Let's just say, the book started slow in my eyes. No fault of the author, I'm sure, but Ch. 2 was a repeat of Ch. 1, so the real action didn't start until the third chapter. After that, however, the pace began to pick up and I found myself interested in not just the mystery but Robin's family and relationships about her. I'm looking forward to the next in the series.

Thank you to #NetGalley and #MediaMedusaLLC for the copy.