Cozy Mystery Review: Nine Lives and Alibis | Cate Conte | Cat Cafe Mystery #7

A 40-year-old unsolved murder and a current murder are linked as Daybreak Island celebrates Halloween with their Haunted Halloween Festival! Nine Lives and Alibis is the seventh book in the Cat Café Mystery series by Cate Conte, and a perfect fall mystery.

About the Book | Nine Lives and Alibis

Characters

Maddie James is the owner of a cat café on Daybreak Island called JJ’s House of Purrs. Her father Brian is the CEO of the local hospital. Her mother Sophie has run several businesses and events over the years. Her sister Val runs an event planning business. Val’s fiance Ethan Birdsong is Maddie’s business partner. Her youngest sister Sam proposed the idea of the Daybreak Island Haunted Halloween Festival to the Chamber of Commerce with their mother taking the lead. Her grandfather is Leo.

Lucas is Maddie’s boyfriend and owns a grooming salon for cats and dogs. Caroline is one of his groomers. Katrina is a friend of Maddie’s and the local animal control officer. Adele is the shelter manager at Maddie’s café. Harry is Adele’s boyfriend and a volunteer. Mich and Clarissa are other employees and volunteers.

Jacob Blair is the owner of the haunted Inn at Lighthouse Point. Andrew Blair is his father. Donald Tunnicliffe is the local funeral director. Hobie is his embalmer. Sal Bonnadonna owns the local liquor store. Vince Salvatore owns Strike 3, a local restaurant. Damian Shaw is a friend of Maddie’s and owns the Lobstah Shack restaurant.

Jade Bennett is the owner of local bar Jade Moon and is dating Craig Tomlin, a local cop and Maddie’s ex-boyfriend. Leopard Man (named Carl) is a local quirky figure who dresses in leopard print and wears a matching tail. His girlfriend Ellen is one of the local librarians. Lilah Gilmore and her husband Henry are considered old money and the town gossips.

Balfour Dempsey is a psychic medium and tarot reader brought to the island for the Haunted Halloween Festival. Tomas is his assistant and cat’s handler. His mother Alice works at the Daybreak Island Gazette for the editor of the newspaper, Becky Walsh. Casey is the receptionist. Aaron is the videographer.

Maeve Sandler is in charge of coordinating Balfour’s schedules, accommodations, and bookings. Sharlene and Manfred are twins and part of Balfour’s entourage. Violet Mooney owns a crystal shop in Connecticut and is in town as a vendor for the festival.

Plot

In Nine Lives and Alibis , the seventh in Cate Conte’s Cat Café beloved cozy mystery series, Daybreak Island is gearing up for Halloween―but this year it seems like it’ll be all tricks and no treats.

It’s October in Daybreak Harbor, which means everything Halloween. The town is going all out for the holiday, hoping to one-up the festivities in neighboring Salem, Massachusetts, and Maddie James is delighted to be part of the planning for the annual happenings.

But trouble brews when Maddie’s youngest sister, Sam, books a famous medium, Balfour Dempsey, to come to town for the celebrations and stay in the local haunted inn―along with his equally famous black cat. The town busybody books a secret reading with Balfour and doesn’t want anyone to know why. Maddie’s best friend Becky is hell-bent on getting Balfour to help her solve two 40-year-old mysteries―a murder and a missing maid. And the psychic has a stalker who’s followed him here to the island, demanding he connect with her dead husband.

When Balfour is pushed off the cliffs behind the inn to his death and his beloved cat goes missing, it throws the whole town into a frenzy. And Maddie and her family find themselves in the middle of a murder mystery straight out of a Halloween movie. (Synopsis from Goodreads)

Review | Nine Lives and Alibis

If you are anything like me, you are begging for fall to stick around a little bit longer before the cold of winter sets in. I hadn’t read any of the Cat Café Mysteries before this book but I found it easy to jump into Nine Lives and Alibis! The book doesn’t reference the outcomes of previous mysteries so this is a series that seems to work in any order. I loved the fall and Halloween setting, though it takes a background to the broader mystery and this could be enjoyed at any time of the year.

Leading character Maddie James owns a cat café on Daybreak Island, which is a small island community off the coast of Massachusetts. Maddie lives with her grandfather and the café is located in a part of their house. This mystery doesn’t involve much of Maddie’s work at the café—it centers around the Haunted Halloween Festival which Maddie’s mother and sisters are working on (in addition to Maddie). The festival features nearly two weeks of events, including pumpkin carving, a cat costume contest, haunted tours at the local Inn, and the return of local resident and famous psychic, Balfour.

Though Balfour grew up on the island, he has gone on to have a successful career as a psychic. His mother Alice lives on the island and insists Balfour is the real deal. Many of the residents are hoping that Balfour can shed light on two forty-year-old mysteries on the island. The first is the murder of a wealthy man at the very haunted Inn hosting the festival, Archie Lang, who was found at the bottom of the elevator shaft. The second was the disappearance several days later of a maid at the Inn named Theresa, who was last seen wearing a catwoman costume at the Halloween party on the island. Pieces of the costume were found discarded at the Inn, but Theresa was never seen again.

These two mysteries are the focus for nearly half of the book, since the present day murder didn’t occur until nearly 50%. When it does, the island community is shocked when it is revealed that Balfour was pushed off a cliff as the festival is kicking off. Maddie finds herself involved in the search for Balfour’s killer, as well as helping her best friend Becky (a local reporter) try to solve the two mysteries from 40 years earlier. Is it possible the three are related?

It appears so, as it is revealed that Balfour had tuned into clues about what happened to Archie Lang many years before and revealed that the murderer was someone who still lived on the island. Maddie begins to suspect that Balfour may have been murdered before he could reveal more details about the identity of the murderer.

Given that the current murder doesn’t occur until halfway through the book, I did find it a bit slow in the first half. I was intrigued by the two cold cases, but they don’t become a focus until the second half. Much of the first half is spent setting up for the festival and learning who the various characters and suspects are. The second half featured a fascinating mystery and an intriguing conclusion to all three mysteries featured in the book.

While the mystery was great, I felt the pacing could have been balanced better if Balfour’s murder had happened sooner. The second half moves quickly as lots of clues, suspects, and motives are uncovered quickly. I ended up really enjoying the mystery and felt the first half could have been tightened up and the back half could have been spread out. However, one plus to the extensive first half is the list of possible suspects honestly felt endless and left a lot of paths that could be followed to solve each of the mysteries. I loved how they tied together in the end.

A great fall read or even a cozy mystery to enjoy any time you are looking to escape to a fall festival for a little bit of murder and mayhem!

Thank you to St. Martin’s Press for my copy. Opinions are my own.

About the Author | Cate Conte

Cate Conte is the author that writes the Cat Cafe Mysteries and the Full Moon Mysteries, featuring newbie witch Violet Mooney. Readers may find a few characters that overlap between the two series. Cate also writes under the name Liz Mugavero, publishing the Pawsitively Organic Mysteries, the first of which was an Agatha Award nominee for Best First Novel. This seven-book series features Stan Connor, a corporate PR maven turned gourmet pet food chef who solves murders in her spare time in her new picturesque small Connecticut town.