Book Review: The Unfortunate Decisions of Dahlia Moss

Book: The Unfortunate Decisions of Dahlia Moss by Max Wirestone

Source: Borrowed from Publisher/NetGalley for an honest review

Publication: Available now

Description:

The odds of Dahlia successfully navigating adulthood are 3,720 to 1. But never tell her the odds.

Meet Dahlia Moss, the reigning queen of unfortunate decision-making in the St. Louis area. Unemployed broke, and on her last bowl of ramen, she's not living her best life. But that's all about to change.

Before Dahlia can make her life any messier on her own she's offered a job. A job that she's woefully under-qualified for. A job that will lead her to a murder, an MMORPG, and possibly a fella (or two?).

Turns out unfortunate decisions abound, and she's just the girl to deal with them.


Rating: 2 stars 

Review:

This started out interesting with a humorous vibe as 20-something unemployed Dahlia Moss was hired by Jonah Long to find the missing Spear of Infinite Piercing. The thing is Dahlia is not a detective but that didn't seem to matter to Jonah. According to him the spear had been stolen from his Kingdom of Zoth video game account. He claimed he already knew who stole it and hired Dahlia to tell the person he knew.

Dahlia's meeting with Kurt Campbell didn't go too well and she was starting to doubt Jonah's claim that Kurt actually stole the spear. Later on back at the apartment she shared with her friend Charice Baumgarten, the police not only inform her that Jonah had been murdered (with a physical version of the spear). But also to question her about her investigating especially since she's not a licensed private investigator.

There were times early on in the story that made me laugh but this story quickly started to lose steam and become really boring. Not only did the mystery not make any sense it wasn't holding my attention. I also found it really farfetched that Jonah's parents' (through their lawyer) would hire Dahlia to continue with her investigation to locate the spear. And add to that, they paid her $10,000.

I felt like the story was also trying too hard to be clever, funny, witty and hipsterish which after awhile started to feel too repetitive. It got to the place I didn't care who had stolen the spear as well as who may have murdered Jonah. The mystery was not really there and the story was all over the place with no real urgency to it, that is until the end.

There was a so called twist to as to why Dahlia was really hired but I guess the whole point is that regardless of the reason she went through with not only finding the missing spear but also who murdered Jonah. This was not a fun read or an interesting mystery and the reveal at the end felt super rushed.

Even though I didn't think this was a fun read, I did like that this cozy mystery had a nerdy/geeky aspect. I also like the diversity of the characters, however they were not really developed or they were only there for the craziness (i.e. Charice). This book and Dahlia both felt like a cheap nerdy knockoff of Veronica Mars but without the good writing and interesting characters. I don't know what it is with cozy mysteries but why is there always some kind of love triangle and this book is no exception. Dahlia has a flirtatious friendship with Police Detective Anson Shuler and something more going with Nathan Willing.

In the end this was just okay and if there happens to be a sequel, I will not be giving it a read.