A Catered St. Patrick's Day by Isis Crawford

In A Catered St. Patrick's Day, Bernie and Libby Simmons, sisters from A Little Taste of Heaven catering, become involved in a St. Patrick's Day murder. When Mike Sweeney is found floating in a vat of green beer, a likely suspect is quickly identified. It's Duncan, the nephew of the caterers' best customer, Bree Nottingham. She approaches the sisters asking if they can help clear him. As they poke around, it sure looks like Duncan is guilty, but he's not the only one that wanted Sweeney dead. It's up to Bernie and Libby to find the killer before more bodies turn up.

This is a very likeable cozy mystery. It was fun to read and quite enjoyable. Crawford has created some good entertaining characters and a pleasant story. However, it was one of those books that didn't stick with me. That is, it was not very memorable. I'm not sure why that was, but it is the 8th book in the series and I didn't read the others. Maybe if I had, I'd have taken to the characters or related to the story or something. Also, I read it rather quickly just after a few other cozy mysteries. Perhaps that made it less effective or less memorable for me. I'd be willing to be that it had more to do with my frame of mind than the quality of the book/story itself.

Having said all of that, I do have the 1st book in the series, A Catered Murder on my to-be-read bookshelf and I'm looking forward to reading it. That should give me a better indication as to whether or not I want to read more from this author.

  I love it when authors include recipes with their mysteries. Since the two main characters are caterers, the book is begging for recipes and the author doesn't disappoint. There's a recipe for Caramel Beer Sauce that sounds intriguing. I'm definitely going to have to try that one. The recipe for Florence's Lemon Cake also sounds wonderful. Unfortunately, the recipe in this uncorrected proof is incomplete.

Recommended.

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

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

A Catered St. Patrick's Day by Isis Crawford, Kensington Books, ©2012. ISBN 9780758247407(Uncorrected proof), 323p, includes recipes.