Wren Johnson runs a shop selling beauty goods made from natural ingredients, like honey and lavender, in the first of a new mystery series. DEATH BEE COMES HER refers to Wren’s early morning walk on the beach, when she discovers the body of Agnes Snow, a noted local lady.
Also enjoying the beach is Wren’s Havana Brown cat, Everett. He’s the one who sniffed out the dead person. While waiting for help to arrive, Wren notices poor Agnes is clutching the wrapper of the same beeswax-and-honey lip balm sold in her store. Officer Jim Hampton certainly seems to consider this suspicious.
This promising start to the An Oregon Honeycomb Mystery series takes place just before Halloween in Oceanview, Oregon, with costumes, pumpkins and decorated shopfronts. Some rather ghoulish behaviour follows when customers want to buy up all the lip balms associated with the death. Would that happen? Well, anyway, the police have confiscated the items, so they don’t get their wish. Wren is not much of a handcrafter other than for her store goods, but her Aunt Eloise regularly competed with the late Agnes for prizes in the world of needlepoint, tapestry, knitting and more. Could rivalry cause someone to murder, or is there a more personal motive? That’s if it was murder at all. Even if the lip balm was implicated, it could have been a severe allergy. But the police look harder and harder at Wren, and her lawyer is kept on the move.
I have greatly enjoyed the Fudge Shop mysteries by the same author, and Nancy CoCo is good at providing a sense of place. This Pacific Northwest setting is breezy, foggy, and resonates with the sound of the waves. The delightful and talkative cat Everett enlivens all his scenes. He goes for walks on a harness with Wren, nips in and out of windows, and expresses his opinions loudly. Wren makes several moves that I wouldn’t have made, nor advised, but she seems incapable of leaving it to the police to investigate. That must be the hallmark of an amateur sleuth.
DEATH BEE COMES HER by Nancy CoCo introduces a new cast and location for those readers who enjoy her other works. With brief recipes for candy and candles, there’s plenty to keep us occupied.
Meet Wren Johnson, owner of Let It Bee - a shop that sells all things honey, from candy to lip balm to candles. Wren lives and works in the small town of Oceanview along the Oregon coast. Her pet cat, Everett is a constant companion. He is a talkative Havana Brown cat who loves to go for walks on a leash.
One day when Wren is walking Everett on the beach, the kitty points Wren to the prone body of Agnes Snow among the dunes. Agnes is the arch-rival of Wren’s Aunt Eloise, and she is definitely dead. The only clue is a label from one of Wren’s handmade lip balms clutched in Agnes’s right hand.
Wren calls 9-1-1 and meets Office Jim Hampton, a Paul Newman lookalike who is suspicious of Wren from the start. Wren is suspect number one in his eyes - and her Aunt Eloise is suspect number two. Wren, along with Everett, must follow the clues to catch the real killer and clear their names.
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