Today I’ll be writing about yet another highly recommended Cozy by site readers, in this case the first entry in Ellen Byron‘s Vintage Cookbook Mystery Series, and as always I will be starting with the first entry, Bayou Book Thief.

Regular site readers are likely aware that I have already featured two other series by Ellen Byron – first, the Cajun Country Mystery Series and second, the Catering Hall Mystery Series, written under the pen name Maria DiRico. Well, that’s no surprise – after all, this is the “most popular and recommended series”, and these have all been very highly recommended series over the years!

This particular series stars Ricki James, 28 year old widow restarting her life in her home city of New Orleans after the death of her actor husband and the disastrous ending of her last job after her previous employer was for a Ponzi scheme. Ricki hopes to be part of the opening of the ‘Bon Vee Culinary House Museum’ by running the museum’s gift shop, Miss Vee’s Vintage Cookbooks and Kitchenware. The Bon Vee Museum celebrates the legendary (fictional) restauranteur Genevieve “Vee” Charbonnet (based on real-world figure Ella Brennan). This really highlights one of the strengths of this book – while some details might be changed, it really takes advantage of the local flavor of Louisiana and particularly New Orleans. So many Cozies are set in small rustic towns that a change of pace to a big city can be very interesting – particularly one with as much history and as specific a culture as New Orleans.

There are few downsides to this new dream job for Ricki, and she quickly proves to get along well with almost all of her fellow employees, a colorful cast of eccentric tour guides and museum staff… with one big exception in curmudgeonly tour guide, Franklin. There are many of Ricki’s fellow employees (and quite a few others outside the Museum) who feel the same way, so no one is particularly upset when Franklin is caught trying to steal shop merchandise and is promptly fired. Naturally, this being a Cozy, it isn’t long before Franklin turns up again – dead in a box that should contain donated books.

As I have for other the other series I’ve written about by Ellen Byron, I would say that the quality of the writing is really the biggest draw to this book. If you’re looking for an extremely well written Cozy with an interesting setting that isn’t a small town or village, I strongly recommend Bayou Book Thief. 

As always, if you want to read more of these brief discussions of some of the more popular Cozy Mystery Series that I’ve written in the past, you can find them at the Most Recommended Cozy Mystery Series page.

PS: For those vintage food fans out there, this book does include several recipes at the end featuring vintage dishes

Today, I will once again be continuing my long-running monthly series highlighting the first entry in a Cozy Mystery, almost always a mystery recommended by site readers multiple times. This particular example is no different in that regard – the first book of Korina Moss‘s Cheese Shop Mystery Series, Cheddar Off Dead.

This is one of the newer Cozy Mysteries that I have featured in this series, starting as recently as 2022, though it already has four entries as of the time of this writing, with a fifth due out later this year. As such, it isn’t surprising to see that the series does a very good job in sticking with and representing the cheeses, in this case highlighting and discussing various cheeses for sale at sleuth Willa Bauer’s French-themed cheese shop, Curds and Whey, located in the scenic small town of Yarrow Glen, in turn located in the Sonoma Valley of California.

Willa has staked her life savings and taken a big loan out to open up the Curds and Whey, a move that represents her dreams for more than a decade of her life, which she has spent working in various cheese-related jobs around the country to learn enough to run a successful small-town artisanal cheese shop. Willa is hoping to get a good review from local food critic, Guy Lippinger, as it would go a long way to help making sure that the shop is a success. Unfortunately, Lippinger has a history of rough reviews, sometimes even being blamed for putting shops out of business, so Willa’s not hoping for too much… but even her lowest expectations aren’t low enough, as he shows up after closing time, obviously not sober, only to berate Willa’s shop, quarrel with the members of her cheese-making class, many of whom he had history, and depart, all in about five minutes.

Naturally, even newer Cozy readers will likely see how this is going. It isn’t long before Willa finds Lippinger again, this time dead with a cheese-cutting knife sticking out of his neck, and naturally, she and everyone else he had ever given a scathing review to were quickly put on the suspect list.

Cheddar Off Dead is a great example of a modern Cozy with a good theme, a flair for highlighting and discussing the theme, and a descriptive small-town setting with plenty of interesting potential suspects to go around. I recommend it to any fan of modern Cozies, particularly anyone with a serious love for all things cheese.

As always, if you want to read more of these brief discussions of some of the more popular Cozy Mystery Series that I’ve written in the past, you can find them at the Most Recommended Cozy Mystery Series page.

PS: For those cheese afficionados out there, this book does include several recipes at the end featuring cheese ideas and dishes

Today I’ll be continuing my long-running series on the first book of popular Cozy Mystery series, most of which have been recommended by site visitors. Today, I’ll be revisiting one of the foundation series for modern Cozies, the Mrs. Murphy Mystery Series by Rita Mae Brown. As always, I will be specifically discussing the first book in the series – in this case, Wish You Were Here.

Sometimes, the books that I write about in this series are mostly or entirely new to me – I have read a blurb or two, or I might have read an entry in the series years ago and barely remember it beyond knowing that I own it still. Other times, these entries are returns to a series that I have read multiple entries to over a number of years – and that is the case this time.

It’s only natural that this series has been recommended many times over the years I have been running the site, as it is either the foundation of many modern Cozy trends or at least a relatively early example of them. It’s also a very long-running series – this first entry in the series came out in 1990, Rita Mae Brown is still putting these out on a mostly annual basis, with the most recent entry coming out earlier this year.

Ostensibly, the sleuth of this mystery is Mary Minor “Harry” Haristeen, the post-mistress of small town Crozet, Virginia, not far from Charlottesville. Harry stumbles across a mystery when she notices a series of postcards, all of them of tombstones and cemeteries with “Wish you were here” computer printed as the only message.

However, Harry’s pets, Mrs. Murphy, her tiger cat, and Tee Tucker, her Welsh Corgi, steal both the scenes and the investigation more often than not. Though Harry isn’t able to communicate with animals, the two pets are quite conversing amongst themselves, and more than willing to take a proactive role in the investigation.

As is sometimes the case, Crozet, Virginia, is a very real place. I’m not sure how accurate Rita Mae Brown’s Crozet is, but it certainly seems like a very lovely and picturesque small southern town – well, except for the unusually high murder rate for such a small community, which I assume is a highly fictional detail!

I will say, for my more “clean” Cozy enthusiasts, there is some swearing, both from human and animal characters. This and a few references that would be considered politically incorrect today both strongly remind the reader that this was written in the ’90s. Neither element bothers me, but I know either could be an issue for some readers.

That said, I’m quite comfortable in suggesting Wish You Were Here as a foundation of modern Cozies, particularly in the “detective animal” subgenre – by all accounts a modern classic.

As always, if you want to read more of these brief discussions of some of the more popular Cozy Mystery Series that I’ve written in the past, you can find them at the Most Recommended Cozy Mystery Series page.

As part of the long-running series featuring the first book of various Cozy Mystery series, mostly recommended by site visitors, today I’ll be discussing The Secret, Book & Scone Society, the first entry in the Secret, Book & Scone Society Mystery Series.

Having been badly burned years before, Nora Pennington has more than her share of experience with serious trauma, and she uses her experience to run Miracle Books, a bookstore that specializes in finding the right book to help others suffering trauma or other pain help recover. This establishment is right at home in Miracle Springs, North Carolina, a small vacation town that caters to many looking for physical or emotional healing.

When a man who had been about to come to Nora’s to find a therapeutic book turns up dead on the train tracks, the sheriff is very quick to come to the conclusion of suicide – too quick for Nora to be comfortable. Nora isn’t the only one who finds Neil’s death suspicious, and together with them they form the Secret, Book & Scone Society, determined to discover if there was a more sinister reason for Neil’s death.

It quickly turns out that the dead man, Neil, has a number of reasons someone might want to see him out of the way. Not only had he hinted to Nora that he had a guilty conscience, he also has a number of ties to the town, including being involved in the development of a new subdivision that would replace a section of rambling countryside with tight-packed houses – unpopular in a tiny town that bills itself on the scenic countryside surrounding it.

There’s definitely a different sort of energy around the Secret, Book & Scone Society than in most Cozies. Generally speaking, Cozies are about a relaxing and easy atmosphere, but this particular book focuses far more on how the past can sometimes be painful and the necessity of slow healing. When the book opens, Nora is intentionally isolated, even though she has lived in the community for years, and only through discussions with the rest of the Society does she gradually open up to forming friendships again. This can be a refreshing change for some, but I can also see how it wouldn’t necessarily be the book for every Cozy fan.

Also, as I have mentioned before, I really appreciate when a book gets to the actual mystery quickly – and this book certainly does that, with the mysterious death being announced at the end of the first chapter.

This isn’t the first book series I’ve discussed by Ellery Adams – you can also read my thoughts on the Books By the Bay Mystery Series. She has also written the Book Retreat Mystery Series, the Books by the Bay Mystery Series, the Charmed Pie Shoppe Mystery Series, and others, often under other names such as J. B. Stanley, or Jennifer Stanley.

As always, if you want to read more of these brief discussions of some of the more popular Cozy Mystery Series that I’ve written in the past, you can find them at the Most Recommended Cozy Mystery Series page.