The Last of August by Brittany Cavallaro

"A Study in Charlotte" was the first book in Brittany Cavallaro's Charlotte Holmes series and I adored the book. I loved the clever take on the story of a female descendant of Sherlock Holmes and her encounters with James "Jamie" Watson. The majority of the book was told from Jamie's perspective; however, the portions told by Charlotte were stellar. This first book took home a five out of five star rating.

Sometime during the first novel you learn about August Moriarty and Charlotte's connection to him and the history between them. When I dove into "The Last of August", book two of the series, I made the assumption that it would be all about him; when in fact the last of August is the title of a painting.

This story takes place in Europe, mostly between England and Germany. Their newest case involved the disappearance of Charlotte's uncle, while they are on their Christmas holiday away from their boarding school in the states.

Brittany Cavallaro

For me, this story was a bit of a stretch and I realized that I was struggling to connect with characters which was different from the first book. I rated this a total of three and a half stars out of five. The concept was good; however, the character connection and how the story wrapped up was a little off kilter for me. Overall good, but not "take my breath away" great.

I will begin book three, "The Case for Jamie" tomorrow morning. I am interested to see where this next book will take place and how things develop between Charlotte and Jamie.

As an author, I love Brittany Cavallaro's writing style and look forward to reading everything she writes.