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Cold Snap by Codi Schneider
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Description
Tucked in the cold Colorado mountains lies the remote village of Gray Birch, a place where outsiders are frowned upon. In this village lives a cat named Bijou. But she’s no ordinary house cat; her ancestors were mousers on Viking longships, and their blood runs through her veins. Since her battle skills are hardly needed in this modern age, however, she spends her energies running the Fox Burrow Pet Inn with her human, Spencer, and her assistant, Skunk, a mentally negligible Pomeranian. Together, the happy trio has created a safe haven for their four-legged guests.
But when Eddy Line, a handsome baker from California, comes to the inn—along with his piglet and pit bull puppy—everything changes. Spencer falls for Eddy, Bijou is unhappy with the sudden changes to her clan, and the townspeople are anything but welcoming; in fact, threats are made against Eddy when he buys the town’s historic firehouse in order to open a bakery.
Then a shocking murder/dognapping occurs on the night of the bakery’s grand opening, and Bijou finds herself thrust into a tangled mystery. To solve it, she will have to summon her inner Viking—and fight tooth and claw for her new clan.
Review
This book killed me with cute! Its Viking kitty Bijou portrayed the ultimate cat qualities perfectly by being equal parts silly and intelligent. I fell in love with her attitude and her imposed superiority over the other animals felt like real thoughts that could actually be going on in a cat’s head. Skunk the Pomeranian was a great comic relief and Hamlet the pig’s different sweaters made me melt! It wasn’t only the animals that stole my heart in this one but the characters’ names as well: the local hairdresser is Bobi Pinn, the police lieutenant is Lou Tennant, and the bakery is called Witching Flour. The fact that all this takes place in a sleepy Colorado mountain town made this book so cozy I wished it was snowing outside my Texas window.
I was so caught up in the adorable world-building going on that when the murder mystery aspect came up I was caught off-guard! I appreciated how it was a truly a whodunnit, there were a few people with motive and opportunity and the perpetrator wasn’t immediately obvious. For all those reasons I felt this book was a solid five stars and highly recommend if you’re an animal lover in search of a good mystery.
Thank you to the publisher Sparkpress and NetGalley for providing an advanced readers copy for review.
