Isis Crawford’s latest catering mystery, “A Catered PTA Murder,” is a breezy, fun-filled, fast-paced whodunit.
Rita Sullivan arrives at A Little Taste of Heaven, a bakeshop-café owned by sisters Bernie and Libby, requesting their services to cater a PTA board meeting and an end-of-year gala.
Bernie and Libby learn that Rita attended high school with them. Now, Rita is the CEO of an influential cosmetic company, Lavish Lipsticks, a far cry from her adolescent wallflower days. She is also the president of the Longley Junior High School PTA, where she has earned a bad reputation with some folks, leaving her with a number of enemies.
When Bernie and Libby arrive at the PTA event with cakes and desserts, they discover Rita dead on the floor, a knife in her chest and an X marked across her body with one of her company’s newest, popular lipsticks.
The local police target a suspect named Abby Roth, the owner of the lipstick and murder weapon, but the suspect’s children plead with Bernie and Libby to help exonerate their mother. Bernie and Libby, juggling their café business, find time to investigate on their own, uncovering suspects who might have had a motive to kill Rita: businesspeople who didn’t get along with the cantankerous CEO.
When the two sisters enter the crime scene unofficially, it is entertaining, showcasing the characters’ camaraderie and adding plenty of amusement as they discuss Rita’s motive for being in the storage room in the first place and who wanted her dead so badly.
“A Catered PTA Murder” is an enjoyable mystery spent with the two quirky sisters. It is filled with many twists and turns and engaging moments as Bernie and Libby hunt down their high school classmate’s killer. The brief chapters propel the story forward, keeping the reader absorbed.
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Romance and murder go hand in hand in Sam Lumley’s second highly compelling Travel Guide to Murder mystery, “Coastal Views to Die For.”
Travel writer Oliver Popp’s new feature assignment includes trying to find romance on the Oregon coast while teaming up again with the extroverted photographer and the man of his dreams, Ricky Warner, a cunning hook perpetrated by Oliver’s managing editor, Dana.
Dana has booked the two men in a bed-and-breakfast along U.S. 101. Oliver and Ricky look forward to a day at the spa, some quiet R&R, nature hikes and romantic nights out on the town.
But it is the complex investigation that tests their relationship. The first night, Ricky crosses paths with a dead body in a hot tub. Another guest falls to his death from the balcony above their room. A woman is found dead during a planned meeting with Ricky and Oliver.
Was it suicide or murder? Ricky and Oliver begin their own investigation, daring to ask subtle, sensitive questions to the innkeeper’s large, extended family members.
Not everybody is welcoming, as Ricky and Oliver find out. Met with hostility, both men decide to press ahead with their investigation, despite the opposition.
An unsettling discovery triggers old family drama when a personal issue over the family’s will and inheritance pits family members against each other, driving some to make rash financial decisions.
“Coastal Views to Die For” is much more than a murder mystery. It is a personal journey for both Oliver and Ricky. The surprising connection between both characters highlights the theme of this one-of-a-kind series.
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Readers will need a notebook to catalog the long list of characters in Lee Hollis’ latest mystery, “The Chowder House Murder,” his best book yet.
In the postcard-perfect coastal town of Halibut Cove, Maine, the legacy of the Holbrook family-owned and operated restaurant is under fire when a regular customer dies after eating a bowl of the famous clam chowder.
Chowder House has been a staple in Halibut Cove for years. But this year, the demise of Chips Hogan, a young resident, ignites headlines in and around the state of Maine when he is poisoned and later found dead in the middle of the street, minutes after eating the tainted soup.
A complicated analysis ensues.
Business matriarch Maggie Holbrook and her 19-year-old granddaughter, Audrey, who served the young man, find themselves in hot water. Jill, Audrey’s mother and Halibut Cove’s police chief, begins an inquiry to help clear her family’s names, assuming they could not have killed Chips Hogan and that it is a misunderstanding.
Then, while leaving the Chowder House restaurant after one of her evening shifts, Audrey is stalked on the way home. Somebody waits for her in the dark. From what she can gather of the shadowy figure, he is tall and broad shouldered but unrecognizable. She rushes home to tell Maggie, which sets the gears in motion for a full-fledged retaliation once they find out who the man stalking Audrey is.
Determined to find the culprit responsible for Chip’s death and understand the volatility of the situation, Jill begins a dogged examination of her friends and neighbors, anybody with motive and opportunity to kill Chips Hogan. Her inquiry takes her to neighboring towns near and far from home, asking all the right questions but placing herself in danger.
“The Chowder House Murder” is an ambitious mystery, crowded with shady suspects, intricate relationships and a coastal town brimming with tension and intrigue. Readers will enjoy the clever twists that Hollis concocts.
Hopefully, this is not a standalone and that we meet this madcap group of characters again soon.