Book Review: Til Death Do Us Part | Kate White | Bailey Weggins #3

I’m back again with my blog spotlight on Kate White, a favorite author of mine! I read almost all of her books before I had a blog, so I’m really excited to get to bring my love of Kate and her work to my blog, and share a bit about why I love her. Today I’ll be sharing the third book in her Bailey Weggins series. The Bailey Weggins novels are almost like a grown up Nancy Drew working as a crime writer in New York City. And actually, Kate White has said she wanted to be a writer after reading her first Nancy Drew book, The Secret of Redgate Farm.

I can see the inspiration, though Kate White does have a really unique voice! Bailey Weggins is smart, kind-hearted, persistent, sassy, and confident—all characteristics I feel that describe Nancy Drew as well! In addition, she’s that sort of amateur sleuth that is always getting called out for being “nosy”, when she’s just trying to keep people alive!

In the third installment of the Bailey Weggins series, Bailey becomes a target after women who were all bridesmaids in the same wedding earlier in the year begin dying under mysterious circumstances. In Kate White’s Til Death Do Us Part, we get a nice mix of Bailey’s personal life and the mystery, though there is less focus on her career with Gloss magazine than we’ve seen in previous books. I found this mystery engaging and filled with fascinating tidbits as Bailey tracks down suspects and experts to weigh in on some very mysterious deaths. As sassy as ever, I loved seeing the side of Bailey that is discovering herself and what she wants out of life.

About the Book | Til Death Do Us Part

True-crime writer and sometime-sleuth Bailey Weggins takes the plunge into a world of designer wedding dresses, domestic divas, and deadly nuptial doings.

When she gets a call from Ashley Hanes on a frigid January night, Bailey’s ready to tell her she’s not pulling any of her Gloss magazine strings to get Ashley into a designer sample sale. But the Connecticut trust-fund baby isn’t looking for fashion favors; she wants to rehash the Cross/Slavin wedding. It turns out that Peyton Cross—the Vera Wang-attired bride and Martha Stewart wannabe—is once again the talk of the town. Two of her bridesmaids have recently died in freak accidents, and Ashley’s terrified she’ll be next.

Bailey’s interest is definitely piqued—she was Peyton’s college roommate and a bridesmaid in her wedding as well. Leaving her latest boyfriend behind in Manhattan, Bailey bundles up for the cold, scenic drive to Ivy Hill Farm in Greenwich, Connecticut, home of Peyton’s burgeoning catering and gourmet-food business. She’s barely begun asking questions when Ashley becomes Bridesmaid Casualty #3.

After Bailey is attacked by an assailant in a cashmere coat, she realizes she’s been targeted by a well-heeled killer who knows how to dress for the weather—which narrows the list of suspects to most of the population of Greenwich, including Peyton’s employees and intimate friends. Before Bailey knows it, she is following a dangerous trail of clues that will take her from the elegant suburbs of Connecticut to New York’s trendy Lower East Side to a fabulous oceanfront hotel room in Miami.

With the clock ticking and a well-concealed murderer vowing to get her out of the picture, Bailey could become the headline of the next true-crime story: Four Funerals and a Wedding.

Review | Til Death Do Us Part

I’m on a re-read of this series and I have to say I’m loving it just as much this time as the first time I read it! In Til Death Do Us Part, we get to see a bit more of Bailey’s personal life and connections. The story centers around her former college roommate Peyton, who got married over the previous summer. Peyton has always been a bit high strung, but Bailey describes her as someone who just as you are ready to write off, surprises you by being awesome.

Peyton also happens to be the ultimate bridezilla, and Bailey doesn’t actually have the most warm and fuzzy feelings about the wedding. But when Ashley (who is perhaps even worse than Peyton in her snobbish ways) reaches out about the deaths of two bridesmaids from the wedding, Bailey promises to help look into it. I found Ashley nearly intolerable, while Peyton has quite a bit of depth as a character.

The deaths of the bridesmaids are fascinating, because they all could easily be written off as accidents, but you can’t help but wonder if something is going on when Ashley becomes the third victim in a short span of time. One dies because a CD player falls into the bathtub (remember CD players?? I grew up in the iPod generation but I do remember old CD players around the house when I was younger!). Another dies because of a lethal combination of MAOI inhibitors and gourmet foods. This death actually led to one of my most popular tweets of all time, where I pondered about the cruelty of a certain type of anti-depressant where the individual can’t eat, among other things, aged cheeses.

As Bailey begins to investigate, several things happen. First, we see the reality of her relationship with Jack unfolding. I won’t spoil where this leads, but this was such a raw and refreshing glimpse of Bailey, outside of work and mystery-solving. Bailey felt very human in this book. Second, we see very little of Bailey’s work at Gloss magazine. Though I missed that aspect, it felt like we got to learn more about other parts of Bailey’s life. Interestingly, Til Death Do Us Part was published in 2005, in the middle stretch of White’s career as the editor-in-chief of Cosmopolitan magazine. I always saw more of Kate in Bailey’s character though than I did head honcho of Gloss, Cat.

The mystery itself was fun to read, and I actually had forgotten the who-dun-it! In fact, when the reveal happened I was shocked all over again, because I was convinced the culprit was someone else!

Don’t forget to check out my other posts on Bailey Weggins:

If Looks Could Kill

A Body to Die For