Title:	Cats, Carats, & Killers
	Author:	T.C. LoTempio
	Published:	March 19, 2024, Beyond the Page
	No. of Pages:	243
	Cover Price:	$14.99 Paperback $5.99 Kindle

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Cats, Carats, & Killers is the fourth installment in the popular Urban Tales Pet Shop Mystery series by T.C. LoTempio. Shell McMillan is the owner of the Urban Tales Pet Shop and is involved in a fundraiser where residents can bring their old items in and get them appraised. The fundraise is a huge success, but one item an old jewelry box that has been appraised and is found to be worth less than $50, generates enough interest by a previous resident of the town, Pete Martin, who may have been involved in a jewelry store heist a decade or so before. Shell then catches a couple trying to steal that same jewelry box. When Shell’s cats are playing a game of chase and knock the jewelry box off a shelf and it breaks, she finds it contains a diamond from that old heist, and then discovers Pete Martin murdered. Now Shell, who is an amateur sleuth, investigates because a man she is sure isn’t guilty is the prime suspect.

LoTempio’s delightful series is especially fun for cat lovers, because her cats (including one named Princess Fuzzypants) are involved in many of the fun scenarios that move the storyline along. She also does an excellent job of developing the characters, which are actually quite believable. Shell is a likeable protagonist, and readers will also enjoy the sub-characters who are introduced in this novel.

All told, there is enough information in this novel to read it as a standalone book, but it is one that will inspire readers to pick up the previous novels in the series.

Special thanks to NetGalley for supplying a review copy of this book.