Review: The Winter of Her Discontent

Title: The Winter of Her Discontent
Author: Kathryn Miller Haines
Page Count: 324 pages
Publisher: HarperCollins
Genre: Historical Fiction, Mystery

50 words or less: It's 1943, and Rosie's still trying to make it as an actress. Jack the ex is still MIA; Al the friend is in jail for murder. She takes a role in a horkburger of a musical to try to uncover the truth and encounters meat, madness, mayhem and more.

Not too long ago I read and reviewed the first book in the Rosie Winter series, The War Against Miss Winter. As much as I enjoyed that book, I have to say that this, the second book in the series, decidedly blew even that book out of the water.

The author really hits her stride with the story here. Maybe it's because we really dive right into the thick of things here and kind of skip all the back story and establishing whatnot that has to be included in a first book, but The Winter of Her Discontent had me wishing I was able to read while I was at work so I could devour the story faster.

This book also did something that doesn't usually happen for me- it made me want to research more about the events that were described. I enjoy historical novels but my curiosity about the events and the time period is usually satisfied by the author's note or the preface or whatever the book has going on. This made me want to find out about black market meat, war profiteers, war brides, dance halls, the USO, the New York mob in the 40s, you name it. The picture of New York that was painted as the backdrop for the story made me want to find out how it compared to the reality.

On top of a really well done historical setting, the author creates a mystery that doesn't give too much away but is still laid out well enough for readers to figure out whodunnit on their own. Clues are marked clearly enough (no dog snot on the carpet here,) without the story being too simple or watered down. At the same time, enough loose ends are dangling and the teaser at the end of the story just make me excited to read the third installment in the series and hope that more are forthcoming.

Overall Grade: A

Up next is Covet by J.R. Ward, which will be featured as a part of the extravaganza over at Blog With Bite. After that, who knows? My TBR pile is so huge it's kind of ridiculous so there are definitely a lot of options.