About the Book

The Skeleton Makes a Friend (A Family Skeleton Mystery)
Cozy Mystery
5th in Series
Setting – New Hampshire (for Georgia’s Summer Job)
Diversion Books (November 6, 2018)
Paperback: 280 pages
ISBN-10: 1635764440
ISBN-13: 978-1635764444
Digital ASIN: B07GT39K2X

Dollycas’s Thoughts

I love this series and I loved this story.

The prestigious Overfeld College has hired Georgia Thackery for their summer program for high schoolers. She, her daughter Madison, and Sid, the skeleton have settled in nicely at a cabin of one of her parent’s former students. That it is right next to a lake makes taking this position almost like a vacation.  When a teenager shows up with her mother in tow looking for someone Georgia has never heard of things get very interesting. Especially when Georgia realizes the person the girl was looking for was Sid’s online gaming persona. She wanted his help in trying to locate a member of the online group who has missed some important events in the game. Georgia feels the player may have a good reason for not playing, vacation, work, school, you know something IRL (in real life). But since Sid and his new friend, of which he does have many, are clearly worried she consents to help track the guy down. Strangely their investigation leads them right back to Overfeld College and a dead body.

What I love best about these stories is that I clearly accept Sid as he is, a walking, talking skeleton with an invisible heart and a wonderful sense of humor, his own cell phone and set of lock pics. He stays up all night, skeletons don’t need to sleep, typing away on his laptop, investigating everything he can online so he can give Georgia a full report in the morning. Then she does some legwork, sometimes bringing him along in a very clever way. Sid also does stakeouts, again at night while Georgia grabs 40 winks. And he can go places and do things Georgia or frankly no other human could ever do. I want my own Sid! Everyone needs a best friend like Sid. Georgia is beyond lucky!

Ms. Perry has written a delightful mystery starring two of my all-time favorite characters. My youngest son and now my grandson are avid video game players. When my grandson arrives I get a hug and a few minutes with him before he signs into the Xbox and puts on his headset to check in with his online friends. (He doesn’t have an Xbox at home so this is a weekend treat.) Just listening to him converse with his friends makes me smile, so I completely understand Sid and his friend’s connection. It is so cool that the author brought this into the cozy mystery realm. Tracking down online friends isn’t easy because they have avatars and different names for each type of game they play. Sid really carried the ball for this part of the investigation. Then he and Georgia and now Madison pull out all the stops to find the killer.

The story takes so many fun twists and turns trying to find the right suspects, what was their motive and how they were benefitted by the death. I really enjoyed the whole process. A very dangerous event puts key characters in danger. It was so exciting and scary too. I was on the edge of my seat just trying to keep up.

Now you know with a cozy mystery there is going to be humor and with a character like Sid, you have to imagine there are going to be laugh out loud moments and there were. The puns, the skeleton’s facial expressions described so perfectly that they were easy to envision, and the predicaments he gets himself into. From beginning to end Sid stole my heart and tickled my funny bone.

If you haven’t read any books in this series you can start with this book because it reads well all on its own. Ms. Perry has done an excellent job in giving you plenty of background to enjoy this installment. You will probably want to then read all the rest.

Woo Hoo! I am excited to add this book to my Best Reads of 2018 list. I can’t wait for Sid and Georgia’s next story.