Every Time I Go on Vacation, Someone Dies

The pseudonymous Mack’s amusing debut and series launch centers on 35-year-old Eleanor Dash, author of a successful cozy mystery series about a woman who solves crimes in exotic vacation spots with the help of handsome con man Connor Smith. The problem for Eleanor is that, for the past 10 years, the real-life Connor Smith has been threatening to sue her for defamation unless she pays him a healthy chunk of her royalties. Fed up with compensating Connor for her own successes, Eleanor has plans to kill off the fictional character in her next book and finally bring the series to an end. She decides to plot the series’ swan song while on a book tour in Italy with Connor, a handful of other authors, and a group of fans who’ve been tapped to post about the tour on Instagram. Partway through Eleanor’s Italian jaunt, however, a desperate Connor informs her that someone is trying to kill him. But is he telling the truth? And if so, should Eleanor be watching her own back? Mack stacks the whodunit plot with perhaps one too many dead-end twists, but Eleanor’s first-person narration is a delight, chock-full of amusing asides (often in footnotes) that wryly examine the craft of mystery writing and business of publishing. A sequel would be welcome. (Apr.)