Review by Booklist Review
After leaving her unrewarding HR job and tired of trying to please her father, avid cook Danielle (Dani) Sloan decides to open Chef-to-Go in the university town of Normalton, Illinois, where she recently inherited an old house. When three university students, including Dani's friend Ivy, lose their apartment, they convince a reluctant Dani to let them live in her home the rent and their help with her fledgling business being the deciding factors. After Dani caters student Regina Bourne's SummerPalooza bash, the privileged, unpleasant Regina is found murdered, and Detective Mikeloff focuses on Dani as the chief suspect. Mikeloff seems to have a vendetta against Dani, so, while attempting to clear herself, she also tries to figure out what the cop has against her. Fans of Joanne Fluke and Diane Mott Davidson will enjoy the cooking frame, the sympathetic characters, and the small-town setting.--O'Brien, Sue Copyright 2018 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Library Journal Review
When Dani Sloan inherits an old house, it offers her the perfect opportunity to open her dream catering company, Chef-To-Go. But the first time Dani caters a large party, a spoiled rich girl dumps a tray of drinks over her head. When the young woman is found dead the next day, an obviously unhinged police detective targets Dani. She teams up with the attractive head of security at the local university to learn who had the opportunity to kill the woman. It seems quite a few people had reasons to want her dead. Readers familiar with Swanson's "Scumble River" series (Dead in the Water) will recognize a few related names and threads in this series launch, which incorporates the typical cozy mystery tropes. There's a little more emphasis on the romantic attraction than readers will see in many first cozies, and for a change, there's a sympathetic killer. VERDICT The catering business offers plenty of opportunities for an amateur sleuth in a pleasant, if ordinary, series opener that will interest fans of the author's other works.-Lesa Holstine, Evansville Vanderburgh P.L., IN © Copyright 2018. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
A comely caterer finds herself in hot water when a crabby client turns up dead.Danielle Sloan couldn't be luckier. Just as she's decided to quit her corporate job at Homestead Insurance and dump her philandering boyfriend, a letter turns up announcing that her grandmother's hitherto unknown childless best friend, Geraldine Cook, has left Dani the 17-room Italianate-style Victorian mansion she was in the process of turning into a bed-and-breakfast when she died. The commercial-grade, Department of Health-inspected kitchen is just the place for her to start a catering business that will prepare nutritious bag lunches to sell to students at nearby Normalton University. And she can rent three of the refurbished bedrooms to Ivy Drake, Tippi Epstein, and Starr Fleming, students who were thrown out of their apartment after a quiet evening soiree turned into a drunken bash. To make sure there's no repeat performance chez Dani, Ivy agrees to let her retired-cop uncle check in at least once a week. And of course Ivy's uncle, Spencer Drake, turns out to be not the doughnut-dulled washout Dani imagined but a trim and sexy 30-something who left the force when undercover work became too stressful. Spencer, who's sworn off women after a short-lived marriage, nevertheless finds himself mooning over Dani's lush lips and nicely rounded bottom. And Dani is thrilled to have Spencer close by when nasty Detective Mikeloff identifies her as the prime suspect in the murder of debutante Regina Bourne, who dies after throwing a royal fit because caterer Dani can't replace the pastries ruined when a drunk guest knocked over a tiki lamp, setting the buffet on fire at Regina's luau-themed party.Like most entries in the female-entrepreneur-who-chucked-a-soulless-corporate-job-for-sole-proprietor-business-venture universe, Swanson offers a spunky heroine, a complicated second-chance love interest, and not much else in her series debut. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
