And really, the Village Library Demon-Hunting Society was exactly what I needed and was looking for - a light, fun, mix of murder mystery and fantasy with an excellent lead character in Librarian Sherry Pinkwhistle. The story takes on the Murder She Wrote pastiche of having the amateur (Sherry) solve way too many murders in a small town in upstate New York for it to be normal, introduces a supernatural element Sherry must discover amidst a mystery, and brings it all together quite nicely. The book begins a little slow, but once the main story kicks in it becomes really hard to put down and is just excellent fun.
Plot Summary:
Librarian Sherry Pinkwhistle moved after her divorce to the small upstate New York town of Winesap, where she quickly became not only the town Librarian, but also the person who excels at somehow helping the local sheriff solve murders. Despite a guilty past she left behind years ago, she's happy there in Winesap, where she has a bunch of friends, a boyfriend in the old antique store owner Alan, and gets enjoyment out of putting the pieces together to solve the oh so many murders that occur in this small town. Sure, it seems at times like she's forgetting something important, but whatever it is, it can't really be that big of a deal, right?
But when the latest murder victim in town is Alan, Sherry snaps through her haze to realize something is horribly wrong in Winesap: a small town like this could not possibly have had this many murders without someone from within or outside noticing...unless something supernatural was responsible. And when her cat, Lord Thomas Crowell, begins talking to her as if he too was possessed by a demon and tells her she is caught in a far more powerful demon's game...well, Sherry finds herself determined to do something....but what? And will Sherry even be able to deal with this demonic threat, even with her friends' support, if she can't solve Alan's murder before said murder is pinned not on the real culprit...but on Sherry herself?
This book is a take on a classic "cozy" mystery structure most famously seen in Murder She Wrote - an amateur sleuth in a small town repeatedly helps the local cops solve murders. The joke in regards to Murder She Wrote was always that the murders could only occur so frequently on that show if the sleuth (Jessica Fletcher in the show) committed them herself. Here, Waggoner has a different answer: the murders and constant murder mysteries are not natural, but caused by the influence of a powerful supernatural creature, one which keeps everyone from noticing what's going on until Sherry finally breaks through. However, while this setup could be used to parody these cozy mystery stories, this novel isn't really a parody but plays it largely straight, so the cozy murder mystery is still the center of this novel - Sherry's investigation of Alan's murder (and the prior murder at the start of the book) is real and something that needs to be dealt with, just with the demonic twist she ALSO has to deal with. So if you like cozy murder mysteries, you'll like this novel.
It helps that Sherry is an excellent lead character to lead us through the story. Here's a woman who is older who has settled down and seemed to find a comfortable life, who naturally struggles with some guilt from her past backstory and the guilt that comes with the revelation of the demon. She thus has to find a way to figure out what's really going on and what she can do with it...and how she can get help from her friends without going actually crazy. There's nothing truly special or unique about Sherry that I can explain, but she's written immensely well by Waggoner such that you're always rooting for her and taken in by her narrative.
It helps that Waggoner does a decent job with the central murder mystery, which features some homages (explicitly in many cases) to some classic mystery stories, as Sherry investigate the number of suspects and tries to figure out who may have done what. Many mysteries in SciFi and Fantasy fail for me because the writer doesn't know how to set up different possible suspects and how to keep people guessing without it feeling like the answer isn't obvious or like it's unfair to the reader, but Waggoner doesn't fall into this trap: there are multiple suspects, motives, and things going on which all get revealed along the way. And throwing Sherry's growing awareness and need to deal with the demon influence in Winesap into all this really aids the mystery quite a bit as it all comes together as a whole.
Really the biggest flaw in this book is that it takes a while to get going - especially if you've read a plot summary and know the demon influence is going to be revealed. The book is not subtle about the fact that Sherry and others keep getting very close to realizing something is wrong (with Sherry's mind losing focus at first when she's about to realize that having so many murders can't be normal) but the book spends its first few chapters dealing with a simple early murder mystery so as I guess to setup the setting and show off how Sherry's murder solving usually works. But when you know - and the author keeps hinting - that there's something more going on, the bunch of chapters before the story gets to that directly did get a bit frustrating. Once the story does get to that reveal, it starts moving much quicker and in ways that are just simply excellent.
Overall, The Village Library Demon-Hunting Society is another winner from C.M. Waggoner, which will appeal to those who enjoy cozy mysteries or light modern fantasy stories which are light enjoyable fun. Recommended.
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