REVIEW: Gambling With Murder is a Southern California Mystery by Lida Sideris. This is the first book I’ve read by this author and I will certainly be open to more. There were a lot of positives about this book. I would recommend it to my best friend.

I enjoyed the characters in the story. The main character is Corrie and is the daughter of a late PI. So, she seems to know her way around investigatiion. She is currently an attorney for a film studio. Her partner in her new adventure of investigation is Veera and this time her mom because they are going to investigate some crimes at an upscale Senior Housing Resort. Her boy friend is a computer science nerd and does online investigations for her. His name is Michael and I would have liked to see more of him in this book. All in all the characters were fun and interesting. They kept me coming back for more.

The plot of the book was a little bit like going in circles. I felt like it was drawn out a little bit and that some of the antics of the senior citizens could have been more interesting. You know most old women are looked at as being nosey. I would have thought more of them would have been hanging around trying to figure out what was going on and poking their nose in where it didn’t belong. But, that wasn’t necessarily the case. Sam seemed to be the ring leader for the errant seniors but, nobody knew who Sam was. 

All in all this was a pretty good cozy mystery. If you like cozy mysteries, check this one out. Lida Sideris has a few other books that are in a series and a children’s book. She might be your next favorite author!

SYNOPSIS: A late-night call is all it takes for rookie lawyer Corrie Locke to kiss her day job at the movie studio goodbye, and do what she does best: flex her sweet P.I. skills and go undercover to find a senior who’s missing from a posh retirement community. One small stumbling block: skirting past security to gain inside access to the exclusive Villa Sunset. Time to call in the heavy artillery. Besides former security guard turned legal assistant-now wannabe P.I.-Veera, Corrie relies on a secret weapon: her mother, a surprisingly eager addition to Corrie’s team. Armed with enough pepper spray to take down a band of Navy Seals, Mom impersonates a senior to infiltrate the Villa, Corrie and Veera in tow. Turns out the job’s not as easy as they’d thought. These seniors have tricks tucked up their sleeves and aren’t afraid of using them.

The action gets dicey when the missing senior case turns into attempted murder by a criminal mind who’s always one step ahead. Corrie’s hot on the trail, but finds more than she bargained for…when her mother becomes a target.