Strictly speaking, the title of The Cornish Campsite Murder by Fiona Leitch should really be ‘Murder at a Cornish Music Festival’. This is a fun, quickly-read murder mystery involving some great named pies, a few ageing rock stars and one dead body on the beach. Seventh in the Nosey Parker cosy crime series, Jodie and fiance DCI Nathan Withers have the weekend off. Like all their friends and family, they’re heading to the local music festival where Jodie and Nathan will run a friend’s catering van, Pie Hard. Of course the pies are named after Die Hard characters. First there is Jodie’s discovery that a couple she recently catered a dinner party for are actually old rockers – Caz Harper, bass player with The Burners, was a teenage idol of Jodie’s – and that the band, now called The Burnouts, will be playing at the festival. Except the band members are squabbling amongst themselves. And then the body is found.
Nathan, off duty and cooking pies with Jodie, keeps an eye on the investigation. The victim is the former lead singer of The Burners, Lee Roskill. But did he die in a drunken or drugged fall onto the rocks, or was he attacked. Lee, it turns out, had recently accused his fellow band members and manager of cheating him out of royalties. Was he killed to keep him quiet? Jodie, unable to accept that her heroine Caz is capable of murder, is determined to unearth the truth.
This story is on all levels all about first impressions, prejudices, acceptance and open-mindedness. Assumptions are made about the band members because they are known to take drugs. Jodie isn’t keen on her mum Shirley’s new friend because Jocasta is introducing Shirley to reiki and CBD oil. Paul Dyer, the local drug dealer who wears his signature hoodie with the snake motif, must be selling dodgy pills to teenagers. Teenagers like Daisy, Jodie’s daughter, now fifteen, enjoying her first festival and all the new experiences on offer. Shirley, Daisy and Jocasta all add their suggestions about the murderer and likely motivations.
I read The Cornish Campsite Murder when I was full of flu and feeling sorry for myself, so it’s a testament to Leitch’s writing that it made me chuckle. Read in 24 hours, it is sufficiently twisty and unpredictable without being confusing. Just what I needed. And yes I was suspicious of the guilty party but only on instinct, without evidence. That’s up to Jodie and Nathan to figure out.

Here are my reviews of the first books in the Nosey Parker series:-
THE CORNISH WEDDING MURDER #1NOSEYPARKER
THE CORNISH VILLAGE MURDER #2NOSEYPARKER
THE PERFECT CORNISH MURDER #3NOSEYPARKER
A CORNISH CHRISTMAS MURDER #4NOSEYPARKER
A CORNISH RECIPE FOR MURDER #5NOSEYPARKER
A CORNISH SEASIDE MURDER #6NOSEYPARKER

If you like this, try:-
‘A Snapshot of Murder’ by Frances Brody #10KATESHACKLETON
‘Big Sky’ by Kate Atkinson #5JACKSONBRODIE
‘An Expert in Murder’ by Nicloa Upson #1JOSEPHINETEY

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
#BookReview THE CORNISH CAMPSITE MURDER by Fiona Leitch https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-8Km via @SandraDanby

COMING SOON… THE NEXT BOOK I REVIEW WILL BE:-