Tempest in a Teapot
Amanda Cooper

Genre:
Mystery
Rating:

Tucked away in the Finger Lakes region of Upstate New York is the charming town of Gracious Grove, where time moves slowly, gossip spreads quickly, and the scones are to die for…

When her fashionable Manhattan restaurant goes under, Sophie Taylor retreats to her grandmother’s cozy shop, Auntie Rose’s Victorian Teahouse, where serenity is steeped to perfection in one of her many antique teapots. The last thing Sophie expects is a bustling calendar of teahouse events, like her old friend Cissy Peterson’s upcoming bridal shower.

Not everyone is pleased with the bride-to-be’s choice of venue—like Cissy’s grandmother, who owns a competing establishment, La Belle Epoque, and has held a long-simmering grudge against Rose for stealing her beau sixty years ago. Tensions reach a boiling point when Cissy’s fiancé’s mother dies while sampling scones at La Belle Epoque. Now, to help her friend, Sophie will have to bag a killer before more of the guest list becomes a hit list…

Review

Experienced chef Sophie Taylor is saddened when she is forced to close her Manhattan restaurant. Her mother’s only advice to her devastated daughter is to marry well, but Sophie wants more out of her life and out of marriage. She leaves Manhattan for the small town of Gracious Grove in upstate New York to stay with her grandmother while she figures out what to do next with her life. She has always loved spending time in the town with her beloved grandmother and is happy to help out in her grandmother’s tea house. She agrees to help plan a bridal shower for an old friend, Cissy Peterson, but then a murder occurs at the competing tea room next door run by Cissy’s grandmother. The victim is Cissy’s future mother-in-law, so for Cissy’s sake, Sophie agrees to do some digging to find out who killed the vivacious woman. Sophie is surprised to find so many potential suspects for the murder along with some underhanded local politics involving many of the town’s citizens, but she won’t give up until the real murderer is found.

I really love how this book begins. Instead of starting with Sophie already ensconced in her new home, the story starts with a prologue showing Sophie on a disastrous blind date arranged by her well-intentioned, but materialistic mother. We get to see the event that is the breaking point that sends Sophie on her way out of the hustle and bustle of New York City and into a more relaxed way of life in upstate New York. Sophie and her grandmother have a wonderful bond and it’s nice to see how well they get along. It’s also refreshing to see that although Sophie is still upset over her restaurant closing, she isn’t bemoaning her fate of living in a small town. She loves the town and couldn’t be happier to be back.

After a wonderful start, the story slows and becomes confusing, in part because some of the supporting characters start to blend together. In addition, although Sophie is thrilled to be with her grandmother in Gracious Grove, she’s still trying to decide what she wants to do for the rest of her life, so her confusion sometimes makes it hard to get a feel for her character. She seems to be a wonderful, kind young woman, but sometimes she would say something that would make you wonder. I found I was able to connect with her more as the book went on. There are an abundance of side characters in addition to Sophie’s family. Cissy is sometimes sweet, sometimes boring and their friend Dana is sometimes funny, but always a bit snarky. Sophie describes it best when she says, “Dana was one of those people who had a sarcastic undertone to almost everything she said.” We all know people like that, and at first I wasn’t sure if I liked Dana, but then she started to grow on me and her sense of humor livened things up when things weren’t moving along in the story.

The murder is resolved by the end of the book in an exciting, dramatic fashion when the suspects are gathered together at the scene of the murder. Some things in the characters’ personal lives aren’t completely wrapped up, and details are left to the imagination, presumably to be further explained in a future book. Although some things were left to the sequel, at least the book doesn’t rely on a frustrating cliffhanger to create interest in a future book. The reader is left wanting more because by the end of the book, the characters seem like old friends and Gracious Grove an adopted hometown.

The book has one scone recipe and two pages of tips about brewing the best-tasting tea. Fans of Laura Childs’ Tea Shop mysteries will enjoy this book. Author Amanda Cooper also writes the Vintage Kitchen and the Merry Muffin mysteries under the name Victoria Hamilton.

Reviewed by Christine