ARC Review: Dead Tired by Kat Ailes

Dead Tired
Author: Kat Ailes
Series: Expectant Detectives Mystery (Book 2)
Publication: Minotaur Books (June 4, 2024)

Description: The second in a charming and hilarious mystery series by Kat Ailes, Dead Tired follows a group of new moms who didn’t think their maternity leave would involve so much murder.

"Full of charming characters, including Alice’s goofy dog, this fast-paced, original cozy is great fun."―Publishers Weekly

Being a new mom is murder.

Alice didn’t think her maternity leave would involve so much, well, murder. Before becoming proud new moms, she and her friends bonded more than members of a prenatal group usually would, as they became accidental amateur sleuths and solved a crime together. Now, with all this behind them and Alice’s son Jack somehow already a year old, Alice is keen to finally catch up on some sleep. So when an opportunity presents itself in the unlikely form of an eco-protest, Alice and her friends willingly chain themselves to trees and settle in as an excuse to get some overdue rest. Not the most comfortable arrangement ever, but at this point, they’ll take what they can get.

However, the next morning one of their fellow protesters is found strangled, and any hope of a peaceful interlude is suddenly swept away. Soon Alice and her friends become entangled in a plot involving rogue artists, an enigmatic local entrepreneur, and nude (optional) protesting, offering an unexpected―but not necessarily unwelcome―break from changing diapers and wrestling baby toys away from Helen the dog.

Alice, whose success rate in solving countryside murder is at an all-time high (one out of one), cannot resist the chance to demonstrate her detective skills once more, and assembles her gang of new moms to investigate this latest mystery in their not-so-sleepy English countryside village.

My Thoughts: Alice and her friends Poppy, Ailsa, and Hen are on their second case in DEAD TIRED. It takes place a year or so after their first. Three of the four are still on maternity leave though Hen has found a job as the personal assistant to Owen Myers, the CEO of Aether - a green energy firm interested in wind power. 

The ladies, along with their one-year-olds and their dogs, are picnicking in a local meadow when they encounter two nude protestors named Leila and Raven who are upset that the meadow will soon become the site of a wind farm. Naturally, this also upsets Ailsa who is the most ecologically minded of the group and who convinces the others - minus Hen - to attend a meeting of the protest group and take part in their upcoming sit-in and be chained to the old growth trees that are in danger of being destroyed. 

However, the protest doesn't go quite as planned. Morning comes and Leila is found strangled to death and still chained to her tree. Though Hen encourages them to leave the investigation to the police in the form of Ailsa's sister Jane Harris, they find themselves getting involved and investigating the protest group and the company Hen works for.

I enjoyed this humorous mystery filled with messy babies, unruly dogs, and very tired women. Alice's viewpoint fills the story with humor of the self-deprecating kind. She's just trying to keep her son Jack and dog Helen under some kind of control and keep them from eating inappropriate things. She is dragged reluctantly into investigating to help her friend Poppy who had been edging into depression but who perks up at this excuse to use her brain. 

Fans of the first book and even newcomers will enjoy meeting this engaging group of new mothers who add murder investigations to their plans for their maternity leaves. 

Favorite Quote:

Caffeine and sugar had become the columns holding up my shaky sanity. The first coffee I'd had, after nine months of caffeine deprivation, had hit me like a ton of cocaine. But I'd been intrigued and saddened to see how quickly my caffeine resistance had built up again, battling as it was against the chronic sleep deprivation of parenthood.

I received this one in exchange for an honest review from NetGalley. You can buy your copy here.