Green Living Can Be Deadly by Staci McLaughlin

In Green Living Can Be Deadly, Dana Lewis organizes the Green Living Festival for the town of Blossom Valley. She's also has set up a booth for her employer, the O'Connell Organic Farm and Spa. When green energy guru, Wendy Stevens, is found dead in the booth next door, Dana has to use all of her detecting skills to find out the truth before the whole festival is deemed a failure.

This is such a fun book. I really enjoyed reading it. It contained a pretty good mystery with lots of red herrings and plenty of suspects. I especially liked the cast of characters. There were those involved in the festival, those at the farm, those in her personal life, and those directly linked to the murder. All of them were varied, interesting and so much fun to read about, even the ones that were hard to like.

I really liked Dana. She was determined to get the job done no matter what it was. Like with the previous book, Dana has her hands full with working at the farm/spa, family commitments, and a journalist boyfriend, yet she still manages to find the time to ferret out the murderer. Her investigative methods were orderly, making following along very easy.

I was amazed at some of the food that Zennia, the cook from the spa, came up with. It sort of gives healthy food a bad reputation. In the last book, I was chiding Dana because she didn't like "healthy" food, but even I wouldn't have eaten some of her food this time around, even though in general I enjoy lots of healthy/vegetarian options with some pretty weird ingredients.

McLaughlin including some tips from the organic farm at the end of the book. These include controlling garden pest naturally, making a banana smoothie, and learning to meditate. All good advice.

I've also read the second book in the series, All Natural Murder. I enjoyed it, too. This really is a fun series.

Highly recommended for cozy mystery fans.

For more information about this book or to browse inside, please visit the Kensington Books website.

For more information about the author and her other books, please visit Staci McLaughlin's website.

Thanks to those nice people from Kensington Books for this review copy.

Green Living Can Be Deadly by Staci McLaughlin, Kensington Books, ©2013. ISBN 9780758275028(Mass Market), 366p.