Amy Flowers returns to Winter Garden, Virginia to care
for her Nana after graduating from culinary school. She
has always wanted to open her own café, and now that
dream is close to becoming a reality. When her Nana
passes away, she leaves Amy her entire estate, a sizable
inheritance. Amy has enough money to either purchase a
restaurant or build her own.
She has been working at Lou's Joint for the past year as
a waitress and decides to ask Lou Lou, the owner, to sell
the restaurant to her. Lou Lou is adamant about not being
interested in selling. But later that day, Amy receives a
call from Lou Lou's son Pete asking her to meet him and
their lawyer at the café that evening. Pete says he has
talked Lou Lou into selling. When Amy arrives, no one is
there except Lou Lou, who is in her office with her head
on her desk. When Amy sees the blood dripping off the
desk and onto the floor, she calls the police.
Because Amy makes the call to the police, and since all
the others who were supposed to be at the meeting have
alibis for being late, Amy is the number one suspect. The
police don't really believe Amy did it, but there is no
one else right now to pin this murder on. Pete is very
eager to sell the restaurant to Amy and closes the deal
before his momma's funeral. Amy is excited about
remodeling, but also wants to clear her name to give her
new café a fighting chance. She goes into sleuth mode and
does some investigating on her own. Amy opens several
cans of worms and gets a lot of people riled up in the
process.
CALAMITY CAFÉ is a delightful cozy mystery by Gayle
Leeson that will leave you wanting more. After reading
the first book in this new series, "Down South
Café," you'll be drooling over the delicious southern
dishes Amy is serving up. And Ms. Leeson includes some of
those recipes at the end of the book. Amy is a strong
main character, surrounded by diverse and quirky
supporting characters. Amy finds so many possible
suspects you don't have a clue who the murderer really
is. She gives a good argument for each one. The pages of
CALAMITY CAFÉ are filled with southern colloquialisms
that I haven't heard in years. Winter Garden is a rural
community steeped in tradition and folklore and a
charming setting for this new series. A great summer read
. . . can't wait for the next one!
Aspiring chef and small-town Virginia native Amy Flowers
is ready to open her own café offering old-fashioned
Southern food. But her dream may go up in smoke when
someone kills the competition...
Tired of waiting tables at Lou’s Joint, Amy Flowers
doesn’t just quit—she offers to buy the place from her
bully of a boss, so she can finally open the café of her
dreams. Amy can't wait to serve the kind of Southern,
down-home treats and dishes that her grandmother always
loved to the kooky cast of regulars at the restaurant.
She knows her comfort food will be the talk of the sweet,
small town of Winter Garden, Virginia.
At first Lou Lou refuses to sell, but when she seems
ready to make a deal, she tells Amy to come see her.
Showing up at the eatery ready to negotiate, Amy is
shocked to find her former employer murdered. As the
prime suspect, Amy will have to clear her name by serving
up the real killer—and with Lou Lou’s stack of enemies,
that’s a tall order.
Includes delicious Southern recipes!
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