The Cozy Mystery List Blog

Cozy Mystery (and Other Favorite) Books, Movies, and TV

Isis Crawford: A Mystery with Recipes Mystery Series

A Catered Murder (A Mystery With Recipes Book 1) I have been surveying some of the Cozy Mystery series that are most frequently recommended in our monthly recommendations, and next on my list is Isis Crawford’s Mystery with Recipes Series. Isis Crawford is somewhat of a veteran writer of Cozy Mysteries. As Barbara Block, she wrote the Robin Light Mysteries which included ten books published between 1994 and 2007.

The Mystery with Recipes Series began with A Catered Murder, published in 2003 and is now up to book sixteen which will be published in a few months (2016). As the name of the series suggests, these books fit squarely within the culinary cozy mystery theme, mysteries with recipes, that is so popular in the Cozy Mystery genre.

Set in Longely, New York, a town that is about a $200 cab ride from New York’s Kennedy Airport, the mysteries involve two sisters, Bernie and Libby Simmons as the sleuths. A Catered Murder begins with Bernie arriving at the family home/bakery/cafe early in the morning after taking such a cab ride. Bernie arrives with no luggage or cash after having flown from Los Angeles following a discovery that her long-time live in boyfriend has been cheating on her with one of her best friends. Bernie left literally everything behind.

Libby, Bernie’s older sister, has been running the cafe and catering business “A Little Taste of Heaven” while also taking care of their wheelchair-bound father who lives in the family’s quarters above the shop. Bernie arrives on the same day as Libby is catering the local high school’s reunion. So Bernie is immediately put to work helping. Yikes! At the reunion dinner, someone dies and the mystery begins!

Libby wants to help find the murderer both because the death occurred during her catering event, but more importantly, because one of her best friends, Tiffany, is accused of the killing. Bernie and Libby’s father, Sean, is the former chief of police of Longely. Luckily, he still has contacts that can help them try to solve the murder even though he is on the “outs” with the current chief of police.

Bernie has a nearly photographic memory. She is always annoying Libby with her encyclopedic knowledge on trivia related to food (or just about anything!) Libby, who is also suffering from a long-ago failed romance, is more the steady matronly type who took over the business of running the shop after their mother died.

Libby and Bernie are somewhat of a rarity in the Cozy Mystery genre in that they both provide substantial contributions to the sleuthing. In A Catered Murder it would be difficult to say which of the two sisters is the primary sleuth. To me, the relationship of the sisters is one of the most attractive parts of the book. The relationship is nicely drawn as complicated with some sparks and disagreements, but it obviously is still based on deep sisterly affection. (Love that!)

There’s a reason Isis Crawford’s Mystery with Recipe series has been recommended by other Cozy Mystery readers. It’s a series that keeps on delivering, a series that is full of characters who will draw you in and make Longely, NY  and the “A Little Taste of Heaven” shop a comfortable and inviting place to which to return.

As an added bonus (for Cozy Mystery readers like me >>> who love holiday themed Cozy Mystery books, Isis Crawford sets a lot of her Cozies during holidays (Christmas, Halloween, Thanksgiving, St. Patrick’s Day, Mother’s Day, and even the Fourth of July!) She has written so many holiday themed Cozies that she is on the “Holiday Theme Mystery Authors …” page on my site. This page features Cozy authors who set a lot of their books during the holidays.)

P.S. If want to read some of the other entries about highly recommended Cozy Mystery series, you can see them on the Most Recommended Cozy Mystery Series page on my site.

Four New-to-the-Site Cozy Mystery Authors: Julia Buckley: Undercover Dish, Rae Davies: Dusty Deals, Christina Freeburn: Faith Hunter Scrap This, Kelly Lane: Olive Grove

Here are four most recent Cozy Mystery authors who I have added to the Cozy-Mystery site. The authors I add to the site come from recommendations of other Cozy Mystery readers.

Julia Buckley – Julia Buckley is a Chicago based writer who has taught high school English for over twenty years. She is the author of the Undercover Dish Mystery Series which stars Lilah Lake, a behind-the-scenes caterer and the Writer’s Apprentice Mystery Series with a sleuth (Lena London) who is the apprentice for a famous author while trying her hand at authoring. Buckley also writes the Teddy Thurber Mystery Series, starring an English teacher, the Madeline Mann Mystery Series, starring a reporter. (Recipes are included in the Undercover Dish Cozy Mysteries.)

Rae Davies – A former reporter who now works as a full-time author, Rae Davies (aka Lori Devoti) writes the Dusty Deals Mystery Series. Davies also teaches writing at the university level, through a continuing education program. Her Dusty Deals series stars another former reporter, Lucy Mathews. Lucy left her job as a crime reporter to open an antiques store in Montana. Lucy is frequently accompanied by Kiska, her Alaskan Malamute.

Christina Freeburn – Christina Freeburn had many careers before finally becoming an author of Cozy Mysteries and romance novels >>> she has been a paralegal, a librarian, a church secretary, a stay-at-home mom, and even a JAG legal specialist in the US Army. It’s no surprise that her Cozy Mystery series, the Faith Hunter Scrap This Mystery Series, stars a former JAG specialist. The sleuth, Faith Hunter, has returned to West Virginia to run her grandmother’s scrapbooking store and solve mysteries!

Kelly Lane – Kelly Lane has worked as a copywriter, journalist, editor, and public relations professional as well as an author. She lives in Virginia, and is the author of the Olive Grove Mystery Series, which stars Eva Knox, an olive grove farmer in Georgia. (Recipes are included in the Olive Grove Cozy Mysteries.)

I hope you enjoy these Cozy Mystery authors as much as the Cozy Mystery readers who recommended them!

1945’s “The Spiral Staircase” Mystery Movie

The Spiral Staircase I watched this movie a few months ago, and was so taken by it that I quickly wrote an entry about it, which I decided to wait and post until I saw another airing of it. Well, that time has come! On Monday – April 18 (2016) at 9:00 PM (Central) they will be airing The Spiral Staircase on Turner Classic Movies, and if you want to see a terrific, old classic mystery movie, go set up your DVRs as soon as you finish reading my entry. Here’s the synopsis from the TCM channel:

THE SPIRAL STAIRCASE (1945)
A serial killer stalks a mute servant girl in a remote mansion.
Dir: Robert Siodmak Cast: Dorothy McGuire, George Brent, Ethel Barrymore.
BW-84 mins

I watch a lot of old, black and white mystery movies, and since I do, I don’t often write an entry about them. For me to do so, the movie has to be particularly good; it has to leave an impression on me >>> and that is what the 1945 version of The Spiral Staircase did!

The Spiral Staircase is based on Ethel Lina White’s novel “Some Must Watch“. I have not read the novel, so I can’t tell you how true-to-the-written word the producers/director stayed. I can, however, tell you that if the movie is anything like Ethel Lina White’s “Some Must Watch“, then the book must be a great mystery read!

The Spiral Staircase, for the most part, takes place inside of an old, elaborately-decorated early 1900s mansion >>> during a fierce thunderstorm. The movie’s director is Robert Siodmak, and he does an absolutely fabulous job accelerating the tension and mystery as the (+/-) hour and a half progresses. I found myself (much to my husband’s chagrin) saying “Don’t go!” and “Don’t do it!” as I gathered up the red herrings and thought that I definitely had solved the mystery (I was wrong!) before the last scene of the movie.

Ethel Barrymore is terrific as Mrs. Warren, the bed-ridden curmudgeonly, old woman. Dorothy McGuire is absolutely wonderful as Helen, the young servant who cannot speak. George Brent (a particular favorite of mine), Kent Smith, Rhonda Flemming, and Gordon Oliver are all great as the secondary characters. And, as an added treat, we get to see Elsa Lanchester do what she did best >>> complain about her lot in life. (I love seeing her do that!)

It wasn’t until after my husband & I watched The Spiral Staircase that I found out that Ethel Lina White’s “Some Must Watch” was made into four versions of The Spiral Staircase. I haven’t seen the other three versions (1961 with Elizabeth Montgomery as Helen, 1975 with Jacqueline Bisset as Helen, and 2000 with Nicolette Sheridan as Helen) so I can’t vouch for them, but I can say this about the 1945 version of The Spiral Staircase: If you get a chance to see this movie, do yourself a favor. It’s a terrific mystery movie!

P.S. So, before you forget, go set up your DVRs!

For more ideas on movies and television shows, be sure to check my TV and Movie page on my site. Here’s the list of television mystery movies that will be on for the remainder of April: Upcoming Television Mystery Movies for April 2016.

Do You Think You Recognize Any of These Cozy Mysteries?

I’m hoping that some of you can help identify these authors/books/series that other Cozy Mystery readers are looking for.

wldmstnglvr:
photographer

… In the not too distant past (within the past year I believe) I read a cozy that featured a woman photographer, her Australian Shepherd, her boyfriend and his Labrador. They both did obedience and agility, including cat agility with her cat. The story also was about illegal exotic bird smuggling.

***** ***** ***** *****
Roslyn:
Island

… Someone at a banquet recommended a mystery series about a lawyer who lives on Catalina Island, single father.

She couldn’t remember the author. I’ve been searching and can’t find it. If you know it, I’d love the author’s name.

***** ***** ***** *****
Melvin R:
cottage

… I am looking for a book that I read several years ago. I am not sure of the author or title, but I do know it was a British cozy. It was written by a woman author and was set in a small English village. The sleuth is the wife of a vicar and they have just moved into their house. There is a cottage by the name of Fox Glove Cottage in it and the murder was done with an overdose of digitalis. The suspect is an herbalist, I think she was, there was a group of hippies and fur protesters and a gay guy. I think it took place around Easter. Other than that I can’t tell you much about the book. … I know it is not one of the M.C. Beaton books.

***** ***** ***** *****
Shirley:
goat

… I am looking for a book and cannot remember the Author or Title. … It was about a woman that had a goat farm and some of her friends dropped by and they noticed the goats surrounding something by a tree in the pasture. As it turned out it was the bodies of a man and woman who had either been murdered or suicide.

***** ***** ***** *****
Jimmy:
waitress

… Does anyone remember the series about a girl who was a waitress, had a best friend who was hippie-like, and who was trying not to fall in love with a man who was almost a gangster-type and who had a gambling establishment. She had a little apartment with shabby furniture that he started trying to replace. He had bodyguards, one of whom cooked. Obviously, I remember about everything but the author’s name and the characters’ names and the titles.

***** ***** ***** *****
Suz-Anne:
Turret

… It involved a man who was a writer and lived in a Victorian (I think), in a seaside village in California, with cats. The house had a turret? at the top where the cat(s) came and went freely. I am going crazy….it’s not my typical read, (although I’ve read all the Cat Who), but I would really love to read these.

Suz-Anne, this sounds like it might be The Cat Who Went Up the Creek by Lilian Jackson Braun, except for your California village.

***** ***** ***** *****

If you think you know who these Cozy Mystery readers are looking for, would you please post a comment? Thank you!

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