Death by Appointment by Mairi Chong tells the first story in the Dr Cathy Moreland mystery series.

In the beginning of the story, Cathy heads to a remote Scottish village to recover after a mental breakdown. The seaside town of Kinnaven seems like a perfect place for healthy walks and ocean air. The opening premise is a bit like The Dark, where Dr. Kate North decides she needs a total change of scene and ditches her old life to take a post as the station physician and winter over in Antarctica. There’s even a bit of the self-medicating, too.

Although Cathy plans to rest and heal quietly, there are a surprising number of deaths and shocks in the village, and soon she’s drawn into the story. There are suspicious deaths, hidden notes, a manipulative “romance” and so many secrets in this little village.  I loved seeing the secrets and backstories connect, even if poor Cathy didn’t get much rest on her vacation. 

A lot of the background in Death by Appointment is revealed by gossip and chat, which felt natural and realistic. I enjoyed meeting the village characters, too, and I was invested in the family and workplace relationships right from the start. (I was less invested in a certain romance plot, but as I get older, I’m starting to think some complicated romances need to just throw the whole man out. Girl, you could do better!)  There are a couple scenes set in the doctor’s office which felt like very real workplace chat. Especially one staffer who was very worried about getting scolded by the boss for somehow misplacing some cash, and concerned that she’d never made a careless mistake at work before, instead of realizing that someone else had been at the cashbox. And honestly, wouldn’t we all think of a workplace mistake instead of crime??? This mix of realistic, every day life, plus grift and tragedy, made a real pageturner for me. Slowly everything begins to come back to a tragic night years ago, although there are revelations up to the very last page of this novel.

You probably know by now that I love suspense and mystery without any gore, and Death By Appointment fits the bill. It’s dark, with both the hostile Scottish coastline and the buried secrets and tragedy in the community. But even with the body count, there’s not really any blood and guts in this story, which is just what I like to read!

I received an eARC from Love Book Tours to participate in this blog tour. Opinions on my blog are my own, as always.