How to Solve Your Own Murder: A Novel (Castle Knoll Files Book 1)

4.1 4.1 out of 5 stars | 5,275 ratings

Price: 1.99

Last update: 01-31-2025


About this item

A Jimmy Fallon’s Book Club Finalist for 2024

AN INSTANT NATIONAL BESTSELLER

A Goodreads Choice Awards Finalist

A GMA Buzz Pick!

One of Amazon's Top 10 Best Books of April, One of Jimmy Fallon's favorite books for Spring 2024, The Top LibraryReads pick for March 2024, A Publishers Marketplace 2024 BuzzBook | One of NPR's Books We Love

Named most anticipated by: Barnes & Noble, Goodreads, BookRiot, BookBub, The Nerd Daily, Shelf Reflection, Novel Suspects, Borrow Read Repeat, The Everygirl, The Scout Guide, The Real Book Spy

For fans of Knives Out and The Thursday Murder Club, an enormously fun mystery about a woman who spends her entire life trying to prevent her foretold murder only to be proven right sixty years later, when she is found dead in her sprawling country estate.... Now it's up to her great-niece to catch the killer.

It’s 1965 and teenage Frances Adams is at an English country fair with her two best friends. But Frances’s night takes a hairpin turn when a fortune-teller makes a bone-chilling prediction: One day, Frances will be murdered. Frances spends a lifetime trying to solve a crime that hasn’t happened yet, compiling dirt on every person who crosses her path in an effort to prevent her own demise. For decades, no one takes Frances seriously, until nearly sixty years later, when Frances is found murdered, like she always said she would be.
 
In the present day, Annie Adams has been summoned to a meeting at the sprawling country estate of her wealthy and reclusive great-aunt Frances. But by the time Annie arrives in the quaint English village of Castle Knoll, Frances is already dead. Annie is determined to catch the killer, but thanks to Frances’s lifelong habit of digging up secrets and lies, it seems every endearing and eccentric villager might just have a motive for her murder. Can Annie safely unravel the dark mystery at the heart of Castle Knoll, or will dredging up the past throw her into the path of a killer?
 
As Annie gets closer to the truth, and closer to the danger, she starts to fear she might inherit her aunt’s fate instead of her fortune.

From the Publisher

Sometimes the perfect murder mystery is the one you see coming. HOW TO SOLVE YOUR OWN MURDER

A masterclass in the art of mystery, says Elle Cosimano about HOW TO SOLVE YOUR OWN MURDER

A perfect shelf companion alongside reader favorites like Agatha Christie, says Sarah Penner

A brilliant and masterful whodunnit, says Liv Constantine about HOW TO SOLVE YOUR OWN MURDER


Top reviews from the United States

  • Rhys
    5.0 out of 5 stars Praised By A Christie Fan
    Reviewed in the United States on December 28, 2024
    I purchased this as a gift for my mother, who is a lifelong fan of golden-age mysteries, and Agatha Christie in particular. She finished recently, and reported finding it absolutely delightful, a perfect balance in difficulty and intrigue and entertainment.
  • Neurasthenic
    4.0 out of 5 stars cute little mystery
    Reviewed in the United States on November 5, 2024
    Kareem Abdul Jabbar recommended this book so I gave it a shot. It's a quick read and inoffensive. Some nice touches — the protagonist has to solve two intertwined mysteries, one from the 1960s and one from the modern day, where the solution to the earlier one (or, rather, the ability of somebody recently to have solved the earlier one) reveals the solution to the more recent one.

    Everybody in the small town where the story is set has a dark secret, which means we get lots of red herrings.

    The book contains many characters spread over two time periods and not so many pages, so it can be a bit dizzying (is this guy the gardener, or the chauffeur?, etc.) The dialog tends to be stilted, with characters taking turns revealing the information needed to move the plot forward.

    There's no reasonable way for the reader to figure out whodunnit, and the motivations finally revealed for the crimes are absurd. Keep your expectations in check and it's a nice little book.
  • Ella Mc
    3.0 out of 5 stars An interesting idea
    Reviewed in the United States on June 14, 2024
    This may be one of the best examples of a great idea with inconsistent follow through that I have seen in a while. I find thrillers and mysteries tolerable even if the writing is atrocious, and the writing is better than that here. It just feels very much like a first try, which may be the most clever part, given that's exactly what the book is supposed to be. It's an easy read, but I found so many leaps in logic paired with brilliance followed by pure stupidity... It's inconsistent. I made a note quite early on wondering whether the narrator was supposed to be unreliable, and those sorts of conflicts are tough. I will try another one by the same author and hope to see her grow as a writer.
  • Adele R
    5.0 out of 5 stars enjoyable
    Reviewed in the United States on December 18, 2024
    Enjoyed this book. Recommend to anyone that enjoys a good cozy mystery. The book is set in a small town with lots of quirky characters. Enjoy.
  • Amazon Customer
    4.0 out of 5 stars 4.25 star read.
    Reviewed in the United States on May 7, 2024
    What a wonderfully paced murder mystery. I’m shocked I enjoyed the slow burn unraveling because I’m usually more inclined to edge of your seat thrillers. This read might just begin a spiral into cozy mysteries.

    I loved the time jumps in the book through the lens of Frances’ old diary. There was a great balance between both Frances and Annie that made this book gel together seamlessly.

    All of the characters were interesting and very believable small townspeople. I could read little novellas about all of them through the sixty year jump.

    My only qualm was that I need just a few more breadcrumbs leading to the final reveal. It wasn’t such a twist that it couldn’t be believed— it made a lot of sense, but I just wanted more moments to think back to and say AHA.
  • lydia mongeon
    5.0 out of 5 stars good read
    Reviewed in the United States on December 23, 2024
    Good easy read. Enjoyed it a lot, and stayed up late to finish it. Is book two already available? Boy I hope so!
  • Geomoo in CA
    4.0 out of 5 stars Not bad, not great
    Reviewed in the United States on June 28, 2024
    3.5 stars rounded up.
    Picked this up on a recommendation from a friend who has given me many great book recommendations. Her recommendation was that it was good, but not as good as the Thursday Murder Club books. Well I definitely agree with that. I think I would have enjoyed it more, were it not for the fact that, at least for me, there were just way way too many characters: seven contemporaries from the 1960s where the chronology starts, then the spouses, children, grandchildren and the spouses of each of those, all showing up at various points. And a non-related friend or two. It was just too much to keep track of. I found it hard to keep going, and impossible to try to figure anything out for myself. I probably wouldn’t have even finished if not for the fact that I did want to know how it ended, which suggests that it was a good story, under the weight of all those people.
    I can’t recommend it myself, but I won’t warn anyone who’s interested in it away from it, however you might just have to keep your own notes (as the main characters do) to keep everyone straight.
  • Jeanne
    3.0 out of 5 stars An interesting plot...
    Reviewed in the United States on July 21, 2024
    ...poorly executed. I read this book based on the blurb that recommended it to fans of Knives Out and the Thursday Murder Club. That comparison is an insult to the authors of those works. The glowing reviews baffle me. The only interesting character is Francis and she's dead, murdered at the beginning. The writing is immature and, at times, just silly. But, fun? No. It's billed as the first in a new series. I don't think I'll reach for the next one.

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