My review:
This book “Ivy is a Weed” by Robert Morse Roseth is a crime fiction which I’m new to. I love playing crime games and watching crime movies but this is my first time reading crime fiction and I really loved it. I love the way the author had chosen the protagonist not to be as the detective officer but as the university’s public reaction director who works for the welfare of the university to discover the culprit behind the murder.
The story was moving at a slow pace and was interesting as it moves from chapter to chapter. Mike is the protagonist whose character was very well portrayed. But my favourite character is Andrea, Mike’s girlfriend who is very supportive of him helped him to solve the murder mystery of Jeremy. Though the chapters were big I didn’t felt boring because of the author’s writing style which was captivating.
I’m unaware of how the University news office works until I read this book and there was a detailed description of the works done by them which shows the author’s research on this field. The title of this book is so apt for the story. I loved the eagerness this story had created in me when I reached the end. The ending was totally different from my expectation and I really liked it. This is really a great book and it deserves appreciation. I would recommend this book to all the crime fiction lovers.
My rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐/5
Blurb:
Was Jeremy Ronson, a top-ranked university official, defenestrated (tossed out a window), or did he defenestrate himself? The police decide his death was accidental, but Mike Woodsen, the university’s PR director, is not convinced. He decides to investigate the death on his own. Woodsen interviews Ronson’s colleagues, an odd collection of administrators, nerds, suckups and misfits, and learns that Ronson had a justified reputation as a sonofabitch, earning many enemies in his chequered career. Meanwhile, Woodsen’s day job gives him a bird’s-eye view of campus life in the 21st century. He works inside a stifling but sometimes-comical university bureaucracy. that seems intent on its own self-destruction by advertising questionable claims—“Hey, we’re better than Harvard! Really we are!”–to enhance its reputation. Woodsen’s investigative skills lead him down several dead-end trails, but just when he is about to throw in his sweaty towel he comes across some clues that could be the skeleton key for unlocking the mystery. Has he solved a puzzle that police say doesn’t even exist? The conclusion he reaches is simultaneously absurd and totally logical. Ivy is a Weed is a murder mystery that will tickle your funnybone. It is in the tradition of Joshua Ferris’s Then We Came to the End and Jillian Medoff’s This Could Hurt. Fans of Dilbert will find the novel a logical extension of its humor, teleported to a university campus, while those watching reruns of The Office will detect a familiar aroma of absurdity and sarcasm.
*Thanks to the author for the eARC*
Deepireads 