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BOOK INFO
Title: The Botanist’s Assistant
Author: Peggy Townsend
Publisher: Berkley
Publish Date: November 18, 2025
Genre: Amateur Sleuth
Series: N/A
My Rating: 3/5
BOOK BLURB
Plenty of people consider Margaret Finch odd. Six-feet-tall and big-boned, she lives alone in a small cabin in the woods, drives a 20-year-old truck, and schedules her life so precisely you can tell the time and day of the week by the chore she is doing and what she is wearing. But the same attributes that cause her to be labeled eccentric—an obsessive attention to detail and the ability to organize almost anything—make her invaluable in her job as Research Assistant II to a talented and charismatic botanist.
It’s those very same qualities, however, that also turn Margaret into a target after a surprising death shakes the small university where she works. Even as authorities claim the death appears to be from natural causes, Margaret fears it might be something more: a murder born of jealousy and dark secrets. With the aid of a newly hired and enigmatic night custodian, Margaret finds herself thrust into the role of detective, forcing her to consider that she may not be able to find the killer before the killer finds her.

MY REVIEW
Margaret’s obsession to detail is what makes her so good as a botanist’s assistant. That attention to detail is what has Margaret believing that a professor’s death is murder.
The Botanist’s Assistant is an engaging mystery. A well-paced plot and quirky characters make this a delightful read.
I received a digital copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
