Book Review: Pas De Death

Book: Pas De Death (Dani Spevak Mystery Series book #3) by Amanda Brice

Source: Borrowed from Publisher/NetGalley for an honest review

Publication: Available now

Description:

pas de deux: (NOUN: pl. pas de deux)

1. A dance for two, especially a dance in ballet consisting of an entrée and adagio, a variation for each dancer, and a coda.
2. A close relationship between two people or things, as during an activity.


pas de death (NOUN: yeah ... totally made up)

1. A dance of death.
2. When Dani Spevak stumbles over a dead body and gets into another crazy situation.


Aspiring ballerina Dani Spevak is back home for the summer, recovering from an injury. What was supposed to be a simple day trip into New York City to visit her friends at the Manhattan Ballet Conservatory turns deadly when Dani discovers that the world of professional ballet can be cutthroat — literally.




Rating: 3 1/2 stars

Review:

I found the story to be delightful and funny and felt like I was reading a modern take on Nancy Drew. This is a fast-paced adorable series about a ballet student who solves mysteries.

The story was about Daniela Spevak a 15-year-old ballet student, who was currently nursing a knee injury. She was on her way into New York City to hang out with her two friends, Maya Sapp and Analisa San Miguel where the latter is attending the Summer Intensive Course at the Manhattan Ballet Conservatory, which is where Dani would be if it wasn't for her injury. 

After a brief meet-up with Analisa, Dani found out her ex-boyfriend Craig Walsh, an up-and-coming actor, was also attending MBC. And not in the mood to possibly run into him, she took off for a little air. However, she didn't get far before she ended up finding the dead body of a young woman in an alley. The young woman she recently sat next to on the bus ride into the city that morning. The victim turned out to be Jennifer Runkle. Jennifer was known around town for her rather harsh and unpopular opinions on her Arts on Fire blog where she reviewed all the performance arts but mainly focused on dance.

Since, she's had some experience solving mysteries, Dani figured that she and her friends could find the killer especially since they knew about the world of dance. The girls got a little help investigating from Craig who was also a potential suspect because he was supposed to have had an interview with the victim to promote his upcoming vampire movie Midnight which was based on a popular novel by the author Bethany Beyers. So while Dani and Craig were investigating, you can tell that they still had feelings for each other even though they broke up. It will be interesting to see how this develops as the series progress.

I enjoyed reading this, the mystery was good as well as being funny. I really like the characters, they were quirky and interesting including Dani's grandmother Rose. I also found it interesting that the killer wasn't so easy to figure out in the beginning.

As much as I like the story I do wish Dani didn't make so many bad/stupid choices such as she chose to avoid talking to the police (especially since she found the victim) until she needed to and she chose to go meet someone alone (which is very dangerous) especially since she had already been threatened to stay away from trying to solve the mystery. And, I also wish the story was longer and a bit more complex but it's probably just right for younger readers.

Overall, this is a really cute and fun story and even if you have not read the other two books in the series, the story is written in a way that the reader could easily understand everything without being confused. I enjoyed this so much I would like to read more from this series.