Another Cozy Coffee Read
Author: Cleo Coyle
Publisher:BerkleyPrime Crime
Genre: Cozy Mystery
Length: 350 pages
Buy Roast Mortem
If you haven’t noticed, I’m a sucker for cozy mysteries. Although I loved them as a child (and had read everything Sherlock Holmes related that I could get my hands on by the time I was ten) I didn’t begin revisiting this passion for whodunits until my post-college years while working as a bookseller at Half Price Books.
Cleo Coyle’s On What Grounds was actually the first of this popular genre I’d ever read and she got me hooked! After discovering her, I dug into the same author team’s Alice Kimberly Haunted Bookshop series and then began branching out to other pleasantly clever authors like Rebecca Kent and Laura Childs. They are fabulous guilty pleasures, and I love the added feature of some series that provide me with baking tips and recipes.
The ninth in the coffeehouse mystery series, Roast Mortem is the first one that I haven’t waited to find in paperback in a bookstore, I couldn’t wait for my lazy browsing to turn up the next installment after doing a blog post on Holiday Grind a few weeks ago. I procured this copy in hardback from the public library across the street, but having read it already, still plan purchase at a later date to make my set complete.
I highly recommend this series, although I must admit that this one frustrated me in a way the previous books have not in the number of typos I discovered. I don’t blame the author, as a writer I am well versed in having moments when your fingers are trying to desperately keep up with your brain resulting in dropped r’s off “yours” and silly errors like “with” getting typed in place of “would.” But I would have expected editors from the Berkley Prime Crime crew to discover those and fix them. At least, I hope that if I get a book published one day, someone has helped me correct my little mishaps before its set before the public eye.
All in all, another fun piece from the Cleo Coyle writing team!
The Holiday Grind… and its aftermath
During the Holidays, I get overwhelmed. The decorations, the obligations, the cold… it just gets to me. But after its all said and done, when gift giving, chores, and the extreme traffic isn’t constantly flooding my daily routine, when its ripped away from me and I am denied it, I get a little bit nostalgic for what I previously despised.
Its perfect timing too, because everything is on sale. You go to your favorite bookstore, what do you find? All the holiday titles are on clearance. You check out any of your favorite retail items for winter, and it’s all so much more affordable than it was the previous months.
So, it’s the tail end of January and beginning of February that I find myself reading titles like Holiday Grind by Cleo Coyle, and stocking up on Scentsy fragrances like Honey Peared Cider, Comfort & Joy, and Pumpkin Roll before they are replaced by Spring and Summer appropriate smells.
Cleo Coyle’s Coffeehouse Mystery Seriesare short, sweet, and cozy. They are the kind of book I either enjoy in a hot bubble bath, or under a pile of afghan blankets, but either way you must have a hot cup of coffee to enjoy them properly. I can’t wait to get my hands on the next: Roast Mortem.
When reading these books, whether it’s a holiday edition or not, its always best to have some café-like scents warming in your burner – like Baked Apple Pie or Hazelnut Latte, typically available from Scentsy year round; or just your usual suspects for fall and winter – like Pumpkin Marshmallow, Central Park Pralines, or Cozy Fireside, scents often only offered during the Holidays.
Despite the disappointment I have that these latter fragrances won’t be available to me during the Spring and Summer months, there is one thing that consoles me: During the month of February, a good portion of them will be 10% off. Between a Scentsy sale and clearance holiday books, I’m quite certain that January and February are the best parts of Winter.
Purchase your Scentsy products today at AKKlemm.scentsy.us. There’s a party open.
The Ghost and Mrs. McClure by Alice Kimberly
The first of the Haunted Bookshop Mystery Series is adorable. I want to shop Buy the Book (a small bookstore that reminds me of Houston’s Murder By the Book), hug Penelope McClure, and exchange witty dialogue with her resident ghost P.I. Jack Shepard. Like her Coffee House Mystery Series (written under the name Cleo Coyle), Alice Kimberly’s bookshop murders are fun, endearing, and most importantly, cozy.