Another Review at MyShelf.Com

Books, Cooks, and Crooks
Novel Idea Mystery #3
Lucy Arlington

Berkley Prime Crime
February 4, 2014 / ISBN 978-0-425-25224-6
Mystery/Cozy/Amateur Sleuth

Reviewed by Laura Hinds

 

In the small town of Inspiration Valley, in North Carolina, a murder is about to occur. Unaware of the forthcoming tragedy, Lila Wilkins is excited and looking forward to the first ever Taste of the Town festival. Lila works for the Novel Idea Literary Agency in town, and she is helping to organize a celebrity chef event, with cooking demonstrations, a writing contest, and book giveaways.

Yet after one of the chefs is killed, a violet death resulting from a gas oven full of cooking spray cans blowing up, Lila learns that not only do the celebrity chefs put on false personas for the public, one of them is most likely a cold-blooded killer. Will the police, led by Lila’s detective boyfriend, Sean Griffiths, be able to solve the crime before the murderer kills again? Or will Lila have to do some behind the scenes sleuthing to find the ingredients necessary for a recipe for murder, and stir the pot of suspects until the killer rises to the top?
This series keeps getting better and better. The authors, Sylvia May and Ellery Adams, who write together as Lucy Arlington, have once again come through with a mystery that is jam packed with possible suspects, believable backstories for the visiting characters, all the while adding depth and detail to the ongoing cast of the series.

I enjoyed this book from cover to cover, and once again wished I could visit Inspiration Valley in real life. However, I am more than happy to visit in books, and hope that there will be many more books in this series and that the authors write together for years and years to come. Five Gold Stars to Books, Cooks, and Crooks

Please be sure to check out the first two books in this series, Buried in a Book and Every Trick in the Book.

 
Reviewed 2014
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