First in a new series!
At the San Francisco Seafood Festival, someone is steamed enough to kill a cook….
When restaurant reviewer Darcy Burnett gets served a pink slip from the San Francisco Chronicle, she needs to come up with an alternative recipe for success quickly. Her feisty aunt Abby owns a tricked-out school bus, which she’s converted into a hip and happening food truck, and Darcy comes aboard as a part-timer while she develops a cookbook project based on recipes from food fests in the Bay Area.
But she soon finds someone’s been trafficking in character assassination—literally—when a local chef turns up dead and her aunt is framed for the murder. The restaurant chef was an outspoken enemy of food trucks, and now Darcy wonders if one of the other vendors did him in. With her aunt’s business—and freedom—on the line, it’s up to Darcy to steer the murder investigation in the right direction and put the brakes on an out-of-control killer….
RECIPES INCLUDED!
For fans of: Riley Adams
When Darcy Burnett loses her job reviewing restaurants for the San Francisco Chronicle, she’s forced to make ends meet by helping her Aunt Abby (a retired lunch lady) serve comfort food out of a converted school bus parked at Fort Mason. Abby’s bus is only one of a dozen mobile eateries that call the fort home – a fact that pleases the dining public, but vexes local restaurant owner Oliver Jameson.
Jameson’s determined to flush the food trucks from Fort Mason before they can drive his business into the ground. Before he can do so, though, he’s found dead in his office, the apparent victim of foul play. The police like Abby for the crime, but Darcy’s convinced one of the other vendors is to blame. Can she solve Jameson’s murder and serve up the real killer to the cops, or is her aunt destined to fry for a crime that somebody else cooked up?
If you’ve been hankering for a lighthearted mystery with a fun premise, a hint of romance, and more tasty-sounding food than you can shake a food truck at, look no further than Death of a Crabby Cook, the first installment in Penny Pike’s new Food Festival Mystery series. Pike sets a quick pace for her tale, offering up both a victim and a suspect in the very first chapter. The stakes aren’t terribly high (I never believed the cops would actually arrest Abby), but the narrative drive is strong, and Pike provides enough viable suspects to keep the reader guessing. The setting is a clever twist on the traditional small town, and the carnival-like atmosphere created by the vendors, their trucks, and their patrons should provide ample fodder for plenty of books to come.
Death of a Crabby Cook’s cast makes for great literary company. Darcy’s a bit of a spazz who’s prone to poor decisions, but she’s also sweet, tenacious, and loyal to a fault, making her a heroine for whom you can’t help but root. Attorney-turned-baker Jake is handsome, smart, chivalrous, knows his way around a cream puff, and has fantastic chemistry with Darcy, making him not only the perfect sidekick, but the perfect love interest, to boot. Dillon and Aunt Abby are occasionally a little too eccentric, but I mostly find their weirdness charming, and I love the non-traditional family that they and Darcy compose. And each of the “food truckers” with whom Darcy interacts has his or her own unique, quirky personality, adding color and humor in all the right places.
Reviewed by Kat
