Book Review -- A Catered Wedding

Isis Crawford's Second Book in the Mystery with Recipes Series.

Jan 2, 2009

A Catered Wedding, the second book in a series of by Isis Crawford, is a cozy mystery with a fast-moving plot, several potential suspects, and unlikely detectives.

Isis Crawford first introduced the Simmons sisters, Bernadette and Libby Simmons in A Catered Murder—a light-hearted and enjoyable cozy mystery that follows the expected formula for the genre with unlikely detectives, a collection of potential suspects to choose from, and a happy ending. A Catered Wedding is the second book in the “Mystery With Recipes” series and follows a similar formula.

Plot Synopsis

In this installment, Libby and Bernie Simmons, who own and operate A Taste of Heaven—a bakery and catering business, have been hired to cater the wedding of Leeza Sharp and Jura Raid. The bride wants to spare no expense on her wedding to the millionaire caviar importer and has planned every detail…except that she is killed just hours before the event in the wedding tent on the estate. The catering sisters discover the body and, after their history of solving a previous murder in their small town of Longley, New York, are asked by some family friends (two lively older women who enjoy dying their hair to unusual colors) to look into the murder and find the killer. The groom doesn’t seem concerned by his fiancée’s death, his assistant has taken on a new look after Leeza’s death, and the family’s business seems to have been involved in some kind of scam, so there are many suspects for the sisters and their father (a retired police chief) to investigate.

Food Writing for Food Lovers

With protagonists that run a bakery, a suspect that owns a caviar business, and recipes at the end of the novel, Crawford is able to use some of her food writing talents to describe delectable menus (such as “marinated grilled quail on mesclun greens with cranberry chutney”) and delicious baked goods (such as chocolate chip macadamia nut cookies made with Lindt chocolate and coffee flavoring).

Review

While the novel is a light easy-to-read cozy mystery, it’s difficult to connect to some of the characters and some grammatical errors in the text distract from the story and sometimes leave the reader confused. Unfortunately, these problems (combined with a somewhat uneven plot) leave the reader disappointed and puzzled, but the book is a typical cozy mystery with likeable main characters and a mystery to solve. The detailed food writing and developing characters, however, keep the novel interesting and worthwhile.

Book Information

The Series

The copyright of the article Book Review -- A Catered Wedding in Cozy Mysteries is owned by Jennifer L. Price. Permission to republish Book Review -- A Catered Wedding in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.