The Primrose Murder Society/Stacy Hackney
William Morrow Paperbacks/March 3, 2026
For fans of cozy mysteries and light humor, The Primrose Murder Society should be added to your TBR pile. With its endearing narrator and fun setting of a posh apartment building housing wine-guzzling who-gives-a-flip seniors, Stacy Hackney’s first foray into adult books will not disappoint.
Lila’s life upends when her husband Ryan flees the country after his indictment for corporate fraud. In the blink of an eye, Lila goes from a woman of leisure to a penny-pincher and pariah within her former country club circles. More concerning is how to handle Bea, Lila’s precocious ten-year old who is far more interested in murders and true crime than experimenting with lip gloss. Bea wears Ryan’s old Atlanta Braves T-shirt every day, clinging to the illusion that he’s coming back at any moment.
And why wouldn’t she? Lila can’t bear to tell her the real truth about her father–either regarding his white collar crimes or their imminent divorce. Lila’s never been good about confrontation, mostly because her mother taught her that staying quiet while looking pretty was the best life skill she could hone.
After Bea is expelled from school, Lila jumps at the chance to live for free at the swanky Primrose building, a Richmond apartment limited to those over age 55 who can afford the exorbitant rent. Stanley, her mother’s current beau, needs someone to clean out his mother Gloria’s old apartment in exchange for a place to stay.
Despite some early challenges–such as learning that Gloria was a hoarder and therefore her apartment is barely fit for, or barely capable of fitting, humans; and run-ins with various Primrose management staff members–Primrose is the fresh start Lila and Bea need. They find unlikely friends in the septuagenarians who live on their floor; and soon Lila is recruited to help Zoe, an apartment staffer, with marketing her trendy new club that seems poised to fail. For the first time since her marriage to Ryan, Lila realizes that maybe she’s capable of being more than a “woman of leisure,” an existence she’d been lulled into by absent husband.
Bigger than that, maybe Lila could even be a detective? Not too long after she and Bea take up residence at the Primrose, one of its wealthiest residents dies and leaves behind a two-million-dollar reward in exchange for solving the mystery of his granddaughter’s death. Years before in 2002, 16-year-old Sophia was killed during what appeared to be a bungled burglary. As her mother and sister have never had closure, Conrad Kent’s dying wish is for certain questions to be answered.
When Bea begs her to help solve the mystery, Lila capitulates due to the lure of the reward and because of how happy this strange project will make her daughter. They enlist the help of their elderly friends down the hall and set to work uncovering the clues they can find about Sophia’s decades-old death. But when another murder rocks the upscale Primrose and Lila becomes the prime suspect, earning the reward money is suddenly the least of Lila’s worries. She has her mother on the phone hissing at her not to cause trouble lest she be kicked out of the Primrose, and a lazy policeman on the other line warning her that he has his eye on her and that her arrest is imminent. Meanwhile, Lila can’t afford food and shelter, much less an attorney. She needs to clear her name–pronto–before she finds herself on the street and/or Bea taken from her. And she can only do that by solving both crimes.
There’s a bit of forced conflict here. Lila as a murder suspect is a bit of a stretch, as the main catalyst seems to be the laziness of the lead detective instead of any hard evidence. There are also a few clues that are too easily handed over, such as a chatty art dealer who willingly implicates himself. It could be worse. There’s still a lot to like, particularly Bea’s lack of filter in speaking and her interactions with the elderly residents. Some of these interactions bloom into relationships that are cute and moving; for example, diva Evelyn pretends to be put out by the girl’s friendship but is secretly thrilled. And Jasper always has cookies at the ready.
The Primrose Murder Society is marketed as “a little bit Gilmore Girls;” and indeed, each focus on a maternal relationship where the mother will do anything for her daughter. Unlike Gilmore Girls’s Rory, however, Bea is younger and more fragile, with a mother who struggles to know what her child needs and how to deliver. Part of the strength of Primrose lies in this distinction, as Lila grows into a woman quite like Lorelei. Lorelei always seemed to have a clear sense of who she is, and we see Lila embrace her strengths as she deals with the aftermath of her husband’s abandonment and the challenges at the Primrose (murder-related or not). Lila’s journey is the backbone of this novel, and we find ourselves rooting for her (and her strange daughter) all the way.
About the reviewer: A writer of dark comedy thrillers, Sarah Reida is currently seeking representation for her sophomore novel, Murder Boat. Her debut, Neighborhood Watch, received a Kirkus Star and was honored as an Amazon editorial pick as one of the Best Books of the Year So Far 2024. Join Sarah’s elite group of Instagram followers here.
