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Book: “The Hanged Man” by Jane Brookwood
Publishing Info: Brookwood Publishing, July 2026
Where Did I Get This Book: I received an ePub from the publicist
Where You Can Get This Book: Amazon | Indiebound
Book Description: Gilmore Girls meets Ghost Whisperer in this cozy metaphysical mystery.
Fiona Miller runs a metaphysical gift shop in Pineridge Hollow. She reads tarot, sells crystals, mixes tea and generally minds her own business. Until she can’t.
When the son of her long-lost best friend Maggie turns up dead, Fiona has decided she’s getting to the bottom of it before she’s even aware of the decision. What stops her cold is the timing — moments before the call, she pulls The Hanged Man tarot card on the heels of a monster zoomie rampage by her cat and familiar Rosie.
Maggie’s son, found hanging in an eerie echo of the boy on the card. Accident? Suicide? Murder? The town has already decided. Fiona’s tarot deck isn’t so sure.
In her little corner of nowhere, with only her tarot to guide her through the stickier situations, Fiona is making her way blindly with little or no technology to guide her. The cat though…
Rosie brings some much-needed intuitive skills along with the Chief, who brings something else. With her Pineridge Hollow crew and Rosie at her side, Fiona follows the cards into buried grudges, old money, and secrets the town spent decades hiding.
On top of everything, The Hanged Man keeps making himself known. Flip it on its head, he whispers. Look…really look, and then, be prepared to wait. You just might be surprised…
Review: Thank you to Books Forward for sending me an ePub of this novel!
I love that we are in the Ber months, finally. For those who don’t know, the “Ber” Months are the last four months of the year, September, October, November, and December. It’s my favorite time of year, as we transition from Summer to Autumn and then ease into Winter, and when September hits I start to shift into two distinct moods: spooky, because of course, and cozy, because Autumn is SO cozy to me. And when I started reading “The Hanged Man” by Jane Brookwood, the start to a new cozy mystery series that has TAROT and ESOTERIC STUFF and QUIRKY CHARACTERS and a CAT, I felt it was the perfect transition read into my favorite time of year. And as someone who likes to collect tarot decks, it was all the more of a hook to me. I’m a huge sucker for this stuff.
The vibes in this are very much aligned with my own personal interests. Not only do we have Fiona who owns her own metaphysical shop filled with tarot, tea, and other esoteric goodies, we also have a story that is just brimming with the kind of cozy energy that just feels like it wraps the reader up with a blanket. The small town is filled with quirky characters, Fiona is likable and relatable, she has an ADORABLE cat, and I loved the tarot themes. It hits all of the best things about a cozy mystery to me, with an interesting hook and a charming setting with enjoyable characters. And my GOSH I really want to go to The Raven to get my cards read, or just to chill out with some tea, a book, and Rosie the cat. One of the greatest traits I look for in a cozy mystery is the vibes, and this one definitely has them.
The mystery itself is pretty good too. I feel like we kind of got thrown into the deep end with Fiona and her community of Pineridge Hollow and their backstories, but I caught up pretty well and by the time the mystery of what happened to Henry Jr, the son of her deceased friend Maggie, who perhaps killed himself by hanging (hence the Hanged Man card that keeps popping up), but perhaps had some enemies in town who would have wanted him dead. Fiona is the kind of amateur detective that I enjoy, intrepid and loyal and perhaps a LITTLE impetuous, but who is likable and easy to root for as well. As she gathers clues and butts heads with local authorities a bit we get some good build up, a nice cast of suspects, and the ever present tarot predictions helping drive the investigation. I kind of figured it out pretty early, but the journey was enjoyable and it didn’t really matter that I called the ending.
“The Hanged Man” is a promising start to a new cozy mystery series that will be perfect Fall reading. Get out your tarot deck, a cup of tea, and a blanket, and then just settle in.
Rating 7: A cozy mystery with a unique premise and the exact right vibes for the upcoming Autumn season!
Reader’s Advisory:
“The Hanged Man” is included on the Goodreads list “Halloween and Autumn Cozy Mysteries”.
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