This is Kelsey Patterson with the Sioux City Public Library and you’re listening to Check It Out.
Today, I’m recommending the first book in a charming new mystery series called Board to Death by C.J. Connor.
A queer 30-something English professor (and closet sci-fi fan), Ben Rosencrantz has returned to his hometown of Salt Lake City to run his family’s board game shop in the trendy Sugar House neighborhood—a community hotspot for players of all ages...and for killer collectors!
Once a happily married and gainfully employed professor, Ben now finds himself a divorced caregiver, looking after his ill father and a Chihuahua named Beans, all while still figuring out the tricky rules of retail management. But on the bright side, the town has become more LGBTQ+ friendly than when he was a teenager and local flower shop owner, Ezra McCaslin seems to enjoy flirting with him.
Despite his usual clientele of gamers, Ben’s barely earning enough to keep the store running and up to date on his father’s medical bills. Then a local toy and game collector named Clive offers him a winning strategy—to purchase a turn-of-the-twentieth-century edition of The Landlord’s Game, the realty and taxation game that inspired Monopoly, at a tenth of the rare edition’s true value. Suspicious of Clive’s shady, low-priced deal, Ben turns him down.
Then Clive turns up dead at Ben’s front door and a backpack full of $100 bills appears on his doorstep. Now Ben is the #1 suspect in Clive’s death, and unless he and Ezra can prove his innocence and find the real killer, he’ll go to jail for murder—and no amount of double dice rolls will be able to set him free.
While Ben certainly isn’t the most confident or toughest of amateur sleuths, together him and Ezra make for a delightfully readable and likeable pair. The pop culture and board game nods in this book infused a wonderful sense of nostalgia into this mystery.
Check out Board to Death and other cozy mystery series starters like it at the Sioux City Public Library.
Support for Check It Out on Siouxland Public Media comes from Avery Brothers.
