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MURDER OF A CHOCOLATE COVERED CHERRY
by Denise Swanson
Signet, April 2008
272 pages
$6.99
ISBN: 0451223683


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

One has to wonder when Skye Denison will cut the apron strings from her overbearing mother. This time, May Denison has entered all the family members in a cooking contest, hoping that the odds are that at least one of them will win. May is the only real cook in the family; Skye's idea of haute cuisine is boiling water for tea. Nonetheless, she allows herself to be roped into her mother's scheme.

All are entered in Grandma Sal's Soup to Nuts Cooking Challenge, run by one of Scumble River's main employers, Sal Fine. May has entered Skye in the One Dish Meal section of the event, her entree being a chicken casserole. Skye valiantly tries for three months to perfect her dish, always with disastrous results, to the increasing dismay of Wally Boyd, the town sheriff and Skye's boyfriend. Incidentally, although May works with Wally at the police department, she is determined to break up the romance -- he is too old, he is divorced, and he's not Catholic -- and to have Skye return to her former beau, Simon Reid, the wealthy town coroner and funeral director.

Into the forced camaraderie of the contestants comes Cherry Alexander, actually less a cook than a writer of somewhat scandalous biographies of celebrities. It takes her less than an hour to alienate her fellow contestants with her arrogance and high-handed behavior. There is little mourning when Skye discovers Cherry's body in the chocolate fountain.

Skye is able to insinuate herself into the investigation because she is a part-time psychological consultant to the police department - a made up job if I've ever heard one. Wally seems to have concocted the job for her, and no one wonders why a rather tiny police department requires a psychological consultant.

While Skye has problems at school, her major difficulty comes from Wally's wealthy father, who has come to town with a twofold mission. He is considering buying Fine Foods, but he must be sure that it is morally clean as a whistle. (Unbeknownst to anyone, the murderer has been trying to sabotage the sale by causing mini disasters at the contest.) Carson Boyd also wants to persuade Wally to come back to Texas and run the family business when he retires. Knowing of Wally's attachment to Skye, he meets her privately and offers her a huge sum of money either to come to Texas with Wally o to give him up. To Wally's delight, Skye passes the test with flying colors.

Skye is a complex heroine. Half the time you want to slap her; the other half time you want to hug her. Her mother May is an obnoxious bully; her uncle, the mayor; her godfather, the motel owner; and her brother, the beauty salon proprietor play only small roles. They have all had larger parts in the other books.

The plot moves along well. Swanson does a good job of integrating the murder investigation, the cooking contest and the takeover bid with Skye's tumultuous personal life. The final result of the cooking contest is a bit of a surprise, as is Skye's resolution of the murder.

Reviewed by Mary Elizabeth Devine, August 2008

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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