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MOZZARELLA MOST MURDEROUS
by Nancy Fairbanks
Berkley, July 2005
304 pages
$6.99
ISBN: 0425203999


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

Carolyn Blue is in Sorrento, Italy, to accompany her husband who will be attending a scientific conference sponsored by a wealthy Italian chemical company. She's also supposed to write her column about Italian dishes with an emphasis on food from Capri so she should be happy. But she's not.

Her husband has been delayed by an airport strike in France and he's there alone with an attractive colleague. The hotel where the conference is to take place has a Swiss cook and the food is terrible. And the worst thing yet, a young woman she met and befriended on her first night alone, Carolyn discovers dead in the hotel pool the next morning.

The Italian police don't seem to care about the young woman's death and Carolyn is not able to help much because she doesn't speak Italian. Luckily another spouse of a scientist in for the conference is all too willing to investigate the crime herself.

She's Bianca Massoni, who's nine months pregnant. An exuberant woman, Bianca looks for any reason that will permit her to leave her two young children at the hotel with her mother-in-law and let her to have one last adventure before the upcoming birth. She's determined to solve the crime. Oh, she'll let Carolyn help investigate the murder, but she has her own suspicions about the American woman Carolyn!

I found this latest in the Carolyn Blue series to be a bit unusual. Carolyn and her husband are having some marital difficulties and I found that to be a bit upsetting. I've always loved that their mature marriage was depicted as a good, solid and loving one. Also, MOZZARELLA MOST MURDEROUS gives a lot of time to Bianca. She's a funny and delightful lady, but Carolyn is written as a somewhat secondary character in her own book.

This is the seventh in the Carolyn Blue culinary series, and like the others it's filled with lots of information about the history and about the food of the host country, and it's done so well and with such exuberance and joy that it's always the best part of every book. Recipes of the dishes are included in the back and just reading them makes you long to indulge in the food.

This murder mystery had a satisfying conclusion, but Carolyn was a bit slow in putting some of the clues together. I found that a little frustrating. Yet no matter the piffling problems, MOZZARELLA MOST MURDEROUS is a very enjoyable mystery. Fans of the series won't want to miss it, and newcomers will not be contused or disappointed in the story. This book stands well on its own. Read MOZZARELLA MOST MURDEROUS -- you'll enjoy your visit to Italy with Carolyn and you'll love the mystery.

Reviewed by Sharon Katz, July 2005

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