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Thursday, October 1, 2015

96) Still Life in Brunswick Stew by Larissa Reinhart

The Blurb :

Cherry Tucker’s in a stew. Art commissions dried up after her nemesis became president of the County Arts Council. Desperate and broke, Cherry and her friend, Eloise, spend a sultry summer weekend hawking their art at the Sidewinder Annual Brunswick Stew Cook-Off.

When a bad case of food poisoning breaks out and Eloise dies, the police brush off her death as accidental. However, Cherry suspects someone spiked the stew and killed her friend. As Cherry calls on cook-off competitors, bitter rivals, and crooked judges, the police get steamed while the killer prepares to cook Cherry’s goose.

My Thoughts :

This is the second book in the Cherry Tucker Mystery series but the fourth book I have read.  You see I read the third and fourth books first and then went back to the first two.  A silly thing to do but sometimes review books are offered/look very good and you don't know or are not informed that the book is not the first in the series.  I have fallen into this trap way too often!

Anyway, I am finally up to date with the series and even though I read these in the wrong order I don't think it made a huge difference.  To be utterly honest I had forgotten the details of the on-going story despite remembering the mysteries.  So there wasn't much for me to get confused about.  I knew who all the characters were and felt very at home with the location and general feel of the series.

This installment came across as slow.  I am not sure if the narrator was purposely slow but I felt she  could have sped up a little.  It all felt very drawn out and it was frustrating and off putting at times.  The mystery was also a little slow but then again I thought it was pretty obvious right from the beginning what had happened.  The when the details came out about the various suspects I also thought it was obvious who had committed the crime.

Cherry came across as slightly annoying in this book in regards to her art work.  I really just wished she would just get her painting done and stop using the excuse of not having a model.  I admit I am not an artist and know nothing of their process but to me it came across as procrastination.  

Still Life in Brunswick Stew was a nice mystery but a poor audio book.  I don't think I would have ever gotten around to getting up to date with this series unless doing so via audio so I am not saying it was the worst but I definitely wouldn't recommend listening to the books.  I think reading them is more fun.  And this series is certainly fun and quirky.







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