*Review* The Murder of Madison Garcia by Marcy McCreary

 

Genre: Mystery/Police Procedural

Published: March 28, 2023

Pages: 336

Sometimes the truth doesn’t set you free—it gets you killed.

Detective Susan Ford notices a missed call on her phone from a number she doesn’t recognize, and when Madison García, a woman with past ties to the town of Monticello, New York, is found stabbed to death the next morning, Susan realizes that Madison was the one who had called her. But why?

Susan teams up with her father, retired Detective Will Ford, to find the killer, and their investigation soon threatens to uncover the García family’s secrets—an inheritance, accidental death, money laundering, extramarital affairs, and family rivalries, just to name a few—and they don’t appreciate the Fords digging into their business.

As the investigation twists and turns, the Fords discover that Madison was planning to confess to a long-kept secret, but someone brutally silenced her. Everyone she knew is a suspect. Anyone could be her killer.

I received a copy of this audiobook through Netgalley. This is my honest review. 

I feel like this is a book that I, personally, should have read rather than listened to. Although the narrator did a great job with distinct voices for the different characters, I struggled to keep their names straight, especially the various suspects, and how they were connected to the victim. That, in turn, made it harder for me to play detective, and playing detective is a large part of the appeal of a book like this. 

With all that in mind, there were several twists and turns in this story, and I saw very few of them coming. And while I'd like to say I figured out the killer way before the detective, that would be a lie. I do think if I'd been reading with my eyeballs instead of my ears, I would have gotten there sooner. I also have a love hate relationship with the journal entry portions of this story. 

The narration itself was great. A wide range of voices and accents (when appropriate) were used and the opposite gendered voices didn't feel like mockeries. Overall I give this book 3.87214 out of 5 stars. - Katie 

Amazon

Marcy McCreary is the author of the Ford Family Mystery series: The Summer of Love and Death (8/24), The Murder of Madison Garcia (3/23), and The Disappearance of Trudy Solomon (9/21), which was a finalist for a Silver Falchion Award for Best Investigator Mystery. Her essays about crime fiction have appeared in Mystery & Suspense, Criminal Element, Women Writers/Women’s Books, and Mystery Readers Journal. She graduated from The George Washington University with a B.A. in American literature and political science and pursued a career in marketing and communications. She lives in Hull, MA with her husband, Lew.

Author Website: MarcyMcCreary.com

Twitter: @mcmarcy

Instagram: @marcymccrearyauthor

Facebook: @marcymccrearywrites

Goodreads: Marcy McCreary

Bookbub: @marcymccreary