For a cracking culinary cozy mystery, I can recommend the sixth book in Amy Patricia Mead's Tish Tarragon Mystery series. Tish is facing a serious personal challenge in OF MUSHROOMS AND MATRIMONY, which is the opposite position of most mysteries. Rather than opening a business, she’s forced to close one.
Cookin' the Books Café is highly popular but Tish’s ex has given her an eviction notice. She has been living above the café and she and her cat Tuna will soon be moving. Where to, she’s not sure. Sheriff Clemson Reade is her new boyfriend and he invites her to move in, but it feels too soon. She doesn’t want to put pressure on the new relationship, and she’s nearly out of work and can’t afford to rent a new catering space.
Tish’s last catered event is at the Abbingdon Green Bed and Breakfast, where friends are providing a wedding event. A quarrelsome TV chef, Gunner Randall, has booked himself a room separate from the wedding party, as he’s on a tour of local hospitality venues. His television show, Taste of America, has a perhaps undeserved top rating, as the man disrespects everyone from production assistants to expert chefs.
Mushrooms turn out to be served by just about everyone hoping to impress Gunner Randall, so when the man dies unexpectedly and toxic fungus is suggested, there’s a wealth of suspects. Sheriff Reade needs someone with catering expertise, so he asks Tish to accompany him as he conducts interviews and searches.
Characterisation is an extremely strong point in this novel. Celestine and Mary Jo, Tish’s best friends who help with the café, are well-rounded and loyal people. Jules, her charming staffer, is a lovely guy who couldn’t be more helpful but has his own life to lead. And all of the suspects, from mushroom growers to photographers, have their own identities, characteristics, and reasons for wishing the arrogant TV chef dead. At times this was like MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS, where everyone had a motive.
There are a couple of recipes in the back, which sound yummy, and one contains mushrooms. Pick your ingredients carefully, is all I can say, after spending two days reading about the consequences of tasting something unwise. OF MUSHROOMS AND MATRIMONY reads like a high point for this series by Amy Patricia Meade, and mystery fans will have a great time.
Tish Tarragon is catering for a wedding, but the weekend goes from sweet to sour when a guest at the venue is poisoned.
Literary caterer and owner of Cookin' the Books cafe Tish Tarragon is pushing thoughts of her impending eviction aside to prepare an appetising welcome buffet for a wedding weekend at Abbingdon Green Bed and Breakfast. While there, Tish witnesses one of the guests, controversial TV chef and restaurant critic, Gunner Randall, threatening staff after missing breakfast and making do with a mushroom omelet.
When Randall is found dead the following day, it soon becomes clear that poisoned mushrooms were behind his demise. With no shortage of potential suspects and motives, can Tish and her new beau, Sheriff Clemson Reade, uncover who was enraged enough with the unsavoury star to silence him for good?
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