I voluntarily reviewed an Advance Reader Copy from Great Escapes Book Tours. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
Chutes and Ladder
by Marc Jedel
Series: Silicon Valley Mystery #2
Series Rating:
Published by BGM Press on March 12, 2019
Pages: 196
Format: Kindle
Source: Great Escapes Book Tours
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Get Your Copy at: Amazon
Dead friend. Free fall. Girl Scouts. Can Uncle Marty untangle the mystery before things really get out of control?
Juggling a budding relationship, demanding job, and mischievous nieces, Marty Golden struggled to keep his head above water — even before his friend’s death. Trying his best to be a good boyfriend and fun uncle, Marty had his own ideas for the weekend until his cunning sister tricked him again.
Convinced his friend’s death was no accident, Marty tries to summon superhero powers but merely manages to bumble along as an amateur sleuth. When Marty’s cousin shows up, she wreaks havoc with his plans and pulls him into yet another mystery.
As threats blossom, Marty doubles down now that his family’s involved. Besides, it’s poor manners to let your friend’s death go unsolved.
Can Marty figure out what happened before a killer, or his imagination, gets to him?
Chutes and Ladder is the second novel in a refreshingly modern mystery series set in Silicon Valley. If you like clever humor and wacky side characters, you’ll love this twisty mystery.
Buy Chutes and Ladder to login to a fresh, funny mystery today!
Marty is at it again and must solve a mystery.
Chutes and Ladder by Marc Jedel is a riveting new cozy mystery. It isn’t like any cozy that I have read, but it is entertaining.
We follow Marty who has helped the San Jose cops with his first mystery a month ago before finding the dead body of his friend in the woods when he’s supposed to be with his oldest niece’s Girl Scout troop. Oops!
What I like:
- Written in the first-person with Marty Golden, our sleuth, being the narrator. Marty is a pretty different character in the fact that he is an engineer and is a bit goofy.
- He works for a company that made a self-driving car service and tries to help out the police who are reluctant about that.
- The crazy Star Trek quotes used throughout the book.
- The other crazy thing is how Marty and the cop, Mace aka Sergeant Jackson, interact. It is a bit weirder than it is typically for the sleuth and the police officer. Then again this is an unusual book.
What I don’t like:
The one thing that I didn’t like was that Marty didn’t see the killer as a threat and someone that warranted more looking into. I know not really all that important, but I thought it was.
Four Star
Chutes and Ladder by Marc Jedel kept me entertained while reading it. I almost had the culprit until that curveball was thrown in. I am giving it a four-star rating and recommending it to anyone that likes cozy mysteries and tea too.
Other books in the Series:
Uncle and Ants
by Marc Jedel
Series: Silicon Valley Mystery #1
Published by BGM Press on October 11, 2018
Genres: Mystery, Amateur Sleuth, Humor
Pages: 315
Format: Paperback or Kindle
Buy on Amazon,
Mysterious attacks. Mischievous nieces. Can a clueless uncle catch a tech-savvy killer … and be home before bedtime?
When a freak accident hospitalizes Marty Golden’s sister and condemns him to babysitter duty, he thinks it’s just another case of hardwired bad luck in Silicon Valley. Until a suspicious murder suggests the mishap was no mere coincidence. Something must be done.
Too bad this quirky, fashion-backward uncle isn’t exactly hero material.
Convinced his sister is in mortal danger, this amateur sleuth follows clues to an oddball array of suspects. Armed with nothing but an eye for detail and powers of self-delusion, Marty tangles with gangsters, a cantankerous school secretary, and a perplexing woman he can’t help but fall for. Glitches in his investigation seem like a piece of cake compared to dinner-prep and bedtime stories with his two precocious, pre-teen nieces.
Can Marty catch the culprit, save his sister, and get his life back in order before he gets unplugged?
Uncle and Ants is the first novel in a refreshingly modern mystery series set in Silicon Valley. If you like clever humor, sassy side characters, and average Joes facing extraordinary circumstances, then you’ll love this twisty mystery.
Tour Schedule
March 25 – Babs Book Bistro – SPOTLIGHT, EXCERPT
March 25 – The Journey Back– REVIEW
March 25 – Mallory Heart’s Cozies – REVIEW
March 26 – My Reading Journeys – CHARACTER GUEST POST
March 26 – Books a Plenty Book Reviews – REVIEW
March 26 – Teresa Watson – REVIEW
March 27 – FUONLYKNEW – SPOTLIGHT
March 27 – Jane Reads – GUEST POST
March 27 – Here’s How It Happened – GUEST POST
March 28 – Cozy Up With Kathy – CHARACTER GUEST POST
March 28 – Carla Loves To Read – REVIEW
March 28 – Devilishly Delicious Book Reviews – REVIEW
March 29 – I’m Into Books – CHARACTER GUEST POST
March 29 – Sneaky the Library Cat’s Blog – CHARACTER INTERVIEW
March 30 – 4covert2overt ☼ A Place In The Spotlight ☼ – SPOTLIGHT
March 31 – ⒾⓃⓉⓇⓄⓈⓅⒺⒸⓉⒾⓋⒺ ⓅⓇⒺⓈⓈ – SPOTLIGHT
March 31 – The Avid Reader – REVIEW
April 1 – Brooke Blogs – SPOTLIGHT, EXCERPT
April 1 – Lisa Ks Book Reviews – REVIEW, AUTHOR INTERVIEW
April 2 – A Blue Million Books – AUTHOR INTERVIEW
April 2 – Baroness’ Book Trove – REVIEW
April 3 – fundinmental – SPOTLIGHT
April 3 – The Pulp and Mystery Shelf – AUTHOR INTERVIEW
April 4 – Ascroft, eh? – AUTHOR INTERVIEW
April 4 – The Book Decoder – REVIEW
April 5 – Celticlady’s Reviews – SPOTLIGHT
April 5 – Literary Gold – REVIEW
April 5 – Community Bookstop – REVIEW
April 6 – ❧Defining Ways❧ – GUEST POST
April 7 – StoreyBook Reviews – REVIEW
April 7 – Readeropolis – GUEST POST
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Thank you for dropping by! I hope you enjoyed this review of Chutes and Ladder by Marc Jedel. Don’t forget to enter the giveaway.
Until the next time,
Happy Reading!
About Marc Jedel
For most of my life, I’ve been inventing stories. Some, especially when I was young, involved my sister as the villain. As my sister’s brother for her entire life, I’m highly qualified to tell the tale of this evolving, quirky sibling relationship.
My writing skills were honed in years of marketing leadership positions in Silicon Valley. While my high tech marketing roles involved crafting plenty of fiction, we called these marketing collateral, emails, and ads.
The publication of my first novel, Uncle and Ants, gave me permission to claim “author” as my job. This leads to way more interesting discussions than answering “marketing.”
My family would tell you that Marty’s character isn’t much of a stretch of the imagination for me, but I proudly resemble that remark.
Like Marty, I live in Silicon Valley and can’t believe that otherwise normal people would willingly jump out of an airplane and call it fun. Unlike Marty, I have a wonderful wife and a neurotic but sweet, small dog, who is often the first to weigh in on the humor in my writing.
Reading this book contributed to these challenges:
- 2019 Cloak and Dagger
- 2019 Craving For Cozies Reading Challenge
- 2019 Cruisin' Thru The Cozies Reading Challenge
- 2019 Goodreads Reading Challenge
- 2019 New Release Challenge
Thanks so much for the lovely review and for hosting me today. I’m very glad you enjoyed CHUTES AND LADDER. I hope your readers will enjoy reading my book as much as I did writing it. At http://www.marcjedel.com, people can get the first chapter FREE for UNCLE AND ANTS (book 1) or CHUTES AND LADDER (book 2) simply by signing up for my newsletter. Book 3, SERF AND TURF, is underway, so now’s a great time to enjoy Uncle Marty’s adventures as he bumbles through his investigations.
Thank you for your review on “Chutes and Ladder” by Marc Jedel and for being part of the book tour.
I’d love the opportunity to read this book from my TBR list.