a haunted inn, a psychic, a cold case murder, and a celebrity cat

It’s late October in New England, so it’s time for the Daybreak Island Haunted Halloween Festival. They’re trying to compete with Salem, Massachusetts by setting up a big celebration on the island, including renowned psychic Balfour Dempsey and tours of the local Inn, which is rumored to be haunted. And right at the heart of the event’s planning and organizing is Maddie James and her family. Her mother is the chair of the event, her sister is the official event planner, and Maddie is the one who gets volunteered to help out wherever she’s needed. And she’s needed in a lot of places.

But Maddie is okay with that. The cat café she runs with her grandfather is doing well, with their manager taking care of most of the day-by-day work. And Maddie loves Daybreak Island and wants to help. Especially since the cat café is going to be highlighted, with a cat costume parade that Grandfather Leo is in charge of.

Maddie and her sister are tasked with picking up Balfour at the airport, which includes his staff of four and his black cat Balfour Jr. The sisters get the group settled in at the Inn, so they have time to prep for Balfour’s readings, which people have been signing up for. But before Balfour gets settled in his room, he sees a photo in the hallway that stops him.

Decades before, there had been a murder in the Inn, a man thrown to his death in the elevator shaft. Balfour, who has been known to help the police with their investigations, looks at the staff photo and notes that the murderer had looked like the men in the photos, with a large mustache. Maddie didn’t really believe in psychic powers, but she did wonder how Balfour had come up with that information.

Then, during the first night of the Inn tours and of Balfour’s readings, the man himself goes missing. When no one can find him in the Inn, Maddie goes looking for him by the cliffs out back. That’s where she finds someone, at the bottom of the cliffs. At the top of the cliff by the broken fence, Maddie finds Balfour’s glasses. She fears that he is the man on the rocks below the Inn.

But who would kill the well-liked man? Was it someone who knew something about that cold case who wanted their secrets kept hidden? Or was it a person who’d had a reading with Balfour and didn’t like what he said? Or was it one of those closest to him, who were upset when Balfour announced that the Halloween festival would be his last event, that he was retiring to focus on his work with the police? Or was it just a terrible accident that ended the man’s life?

Nine Lives and Alibis is book 7 in Cate Conte’s Cat Café Mystery series. It’s perfect for spooky season, with cat JJ parading around in his Sherlock Holmes costume. This one is filled with ghost stories and cold cases and family drama and plenty of cats. There are lots of suspects in the murder, but as you can maybe guess from the title, there are also lots of alibis.

This was the first book I’ve read in the Cat Café Mystery series, but it won’t be my last. I really liked Maddie and JJ and want to spend more time with them. But I will say that this story focused on Maddie and her family almost as much as the murder. I’m not a big fan of the mysteries where the murder happens on the second page, but this one doesn’t happen until about halfway through. I would have preferred a little less of the event chaos up front and a little more investigation (I mean, she had less than half the story to find a killer). But I like these characters and want to get to spend more time in Daybreak Island, and especially in the cat café.

Egalleys for Nine Lives and Alibis were provided by Minotaur Books through NetGalley, with many thanks.