Review by Booklist Review
Key West food critic Hayley Snow's relaxing time at the beach is disturbed when her dog digs up a dead body. The victim, womanizer and heartily disliked real-estate developer Gerald Garcia, has many enemies, including his wife. A witness on the scene, Davis Jager, asks Hayley to investigate because he believes the police consider him a suspect. Disliking Jager, Hayley investigates anyway because she feels some responsibility, thanks to her discovery of the body, and she wishes to help her husband, Nathan, a Key West police detective. Instead of discouraging her, the police ask Hayley to go undercover, and she even goes along on some of the interviews while also conducting her own side investigation. Complicating matters, Nathan's father is in town--the two have a difficult relationship--and Hayley faces writing deadlines and must assist her caterer mother. A crisply detailed frame, including writing, catering, and houseboat living, along with plenty of recipes and foodie talk, add up to a satisfying cozy.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Burdette's solid 12th Key West Food Critic mystery (after 2021's A Scone of Contention) finds Hayley Snow, a food critic for Key Zest magazine, taking a beach trip to an island north of Key West, Fla., along with Nathan Bransford, her police detective husband, and their two dogs. There, one of the dogs uncovers a body in the sand that turns out to belong to restaurant and bar owner Gerald Garcia. During the Covid pandemic, Garcia refused to close his eating and drinking establishments, and he was rumored to be bankrolling the lobbyists promoting cruise ships. In short, the victim had many enemies with multiple motives to want him dead. Hayley and Nathan help the sheriff's department investigate. Meanwhile, Hayley discovers a cookbook published by the Key West Woman's Club in 1949 hidden in a drawer at the club. The glimpses of life in Key West decades earlier adds historical color to the somewhat perfunctory sleuthing. Recipes for such delectables as banana cream pie and pigs in a blanket round out the volume. Culinary cozy fans are in for a treat. Agent: Paige Wheeler, Creative Media. (Aug.)
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Review by Kirkus Book Review
Key West food critic Hayley Snow proves once again that she understands crime as well as cuisine. Now that she's married to police officer Nathan Bransford, Hayley has to be more circumspect in her sleuthing activities. But when she and a friend take their dogs for a run to Boca Chica Beach, located on Geiger Key north of Key West, and Nathan's dog, Ziggy, digs up a body, she can't resist getting involved. Bird-watcher Davis Jager identifies the corpse as Gerald Garcia, better known as GG, a man who had a boatload of enemies. Nathan's stressed by his dysfunctional family. His parents are divorced, and his sister doesn't speak to their father, a police officer who's currently in the Keys vetting the department's paperwork. Gossip is the lifeblood of Key West, and Hayley soon learns that GG's suspicious business dealings pale beside his reputation as a predator who targeted younger women and even his wife's former best friend. Hayley's mother is hired to cater for the funeral gathering, and while cleaning up, Hayley makes a fascinating discovery at the Woman's Club, whose cookbook provides a look at life in Key West in the 1940s. Her discovery of an old box containing a diary and sketches for the original cookbook indicates that the apple didn't fall far from the tree, since GG's father was also a womanizer. So did GG die because of his business deals or for more personal reasons? A suitably steamy background for a complex tale of murder and deceit. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
