Last Updated on April 22, 2026
In a bid to keep my reading choices nice and varied, I often randomly pick books from Kindle Unlimited that I’ve never heard of.
Sometimes, it’s the title; other times, it’s the little blurb that catches my attention. Either way, that is how I ended up with A Cruise to Murder by author Dawn Brookes.
Was it a good pick? Not for me and I have plenty of reasons why. You might think differently, so I’ll give you a synopsis of the story and a brief rundown of why I was tempted to give up on this book!
And then, you can make your own mind up.
Meet Rachel Prince
If you could conjure up the perfect leading lady, Rachel Prince would probably be it. She’s 25, a Police Officer in Leeds, gorgeous looking, loves exercising and is engaged to be married.
She’s smart, funny, clever, kind – basically all of the good stuff and none of the bad.
The problem is that Robert, the fiancee, has just dumped her in favor of another woman, and Rachel’s world has been turned upside down.
To take her mind off things, she decides to go on a cruise to spend time with her friend Sarah (who is a medic on board).
I won’t bore you with all the unnecessary details, but suffice it to say that she befriends the older lady, Marjorie Snellthorpe, who is in the cabin next door.
When another passenger on board is killed during the cruise, Rachel believes Marjorie is in danger.
But who would want to kill a harmless old lady? And what happens if they try again?
Rachel gets to grips with her investigation, determined to figure out just what exactly is going on.
So Many Problems
Now, I can imagine that from my summary above, this would seem like a pretty good plot and story. It should have been, but there are so many things wrong with it that I’ll have to go back to the beginning.
Robert dumping Rachel has all the depth of reading a shopping list. I didn’t believe for one second that these two were supposed to be in love and getting married.
I’m fairly certain it was just the hook used to get Rachel on holiday on a cruise ship.
Once on the ship, it’s clear that Rachel has some serious issues. And I quote, “Having noticed a number of well-proportioned people milling around, she was determined not to gain weight over the next fortnight”. Excuse me????
Her weight and obsession with it are constant throughout the book. I lost count of how many times Rachel was running up and down stairs, running lap after lap on deck 16, going to the gym and turning down dessert, and only eating salad at lunch (cause, you know, calories, right!).
When not consumed by the possibility of gaining weight, Rachel spends her time eyeing up the guy sitting next to her at the table. Or, when he kisses her, running away from him.
We’re meant to believe that there’s something not quite right with him. Even when she thinks he could possibly be the killer, her main reason for hoping he isn’t is because she fancies him.
And, speaking of the killer, you won’t see the whodunit coming, primarily because they are never mentioned in the book. Not once. Never.
In fact, you have to get 40% of the way into the book for the death to occur, and even then, it’s another hundred pages or so before anybody realizes it wasn’t an accident.
And the real kicker in A Cruise to Murder? She doesn’t even solve the case. She just happens to be there when a crime is being committed, gets injured, and somebody else puts the cuffs on him and tells her about it.
Judgey and Unkind
I genuinely never thought I would say this about any book in the cozy mystery genre, but this book is full of judgemental and unkind characters and descriptions.
From nearly writing off murder as suicide because the victim was old and grieving for her recently deceased husband to commenting that another older woman was showing signs of liking a drink or even how appalled Rachel was by the overweight guests on the cruise ship, the judgey and snarky comments are jaw-dropping.
And don’t get me started on the sly references about anybody who isn’t white and/or English.
Need to be inspired to become a police officer? Just report your local Muslim student to the anti-crime hotline and believe you prevented a terrorist attack.
Want to shoe-horn an Asian family into the story? Stick them on a bus, wearing saris, and chat with their teenage daughter about arranged marriage.
Don’t forget to only reference the employees on the cruise ship by their country of origin – Filipino, Romanian, Jamaican etc…and not by their actual names – do they even have any??? Who knows? We never find out.
I actually went so far as to read some of it out loud to the other half, and after he stopped laughing, he reckoned a child could have written better material.
Speaking of the writing style, let me put it this way: Agatha Christie isn’t in any danger of losing her crown as the Queen of Crime any time soon!
And now that I’ve gotten all of that off my chest I’m off to find a palate cleanser and hope that I never have to read a Rachel Prince novel ever again.
