Genre: Mystery
Five Stars
When the owner of Lucille's favorite pizzeria drops dead at her feet, she’s left wondering who could have harmed such
a kind man—and wondering where she’ll get her favorite food now. Deciding to go
undercover as a pizza maker to sniff out the clues—and maybe an extra slice or
two—Lucille’s determined to track down the culprit before they can strike again.
As the hunt for the killer heats up, Lucille and her friend Flo dig deeper into the crime and discover a jealous wife, a competitive pizza man who would kill for more business, and a decades-old mystery that may hold the key to the murder. Trouble is, the one person who could break the case wide open is a nun who took a vow of silence—and she’s not talking.
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Lucille stops in at her favorite pizzeria and speaks briefly with the owner's wife, Tiffany, and purchases a couple of slices for her lunch. She then goes to work at St. Rocco's, and while checking flowers, the pizzeria's owner, Sal, runs into the church asking for the priest. It turns out, Sal has been stabbed, and dies before he can tell Lucille who did this. Thus begins the search for his killer...
Now we already know Lucille and her friend Flo are going to investigate the murder, even though they know they shouldn't. But what makes this book good is the fact that the investigation seems to go in so many different directions. They have no problem questioning anyone, even if it means the police are eventually going to show up.
I enjoyed the mystery as well as the back story between Lucille and her family. I did come away with the thought that her daughter Bernadette is one of the laziest people I've ever seen in a book. She almost appears to be a walking zombie, doing nothing but eating and watching television, even if she does have a baby. (Most young mothers I've met are quite harried, just trying to keep it all together, but this girl barely speaks and doesn't do anything around the house to help her mom at all.) Flo is a hoot, still trying to hang onto her youth at any cost, and even though one isn't old when one is in their fifties, they're still not twenty, and the relationships between Lucille, Frankie (her husband) and the rest of her relatives seem real.
The mystery itself was indeed inventive. It made you want to find out what exactly was happening, and why, so much so that I finished the book in one sitting (into the wee hours of the morning and I'll probably suffer for it today!) but I honestly couldn't put it down once things started to get going and more than one person seemed suspicious. The ending was all I could have hoped for, and more.
If one thing about the book bothered me, it was the way Lucille talked - I get that she's Italian, but she used a lot of double negatives and spoke differently than every other character, including her mother. Things like "them" instead of "the,"saying "this here" instead of "this," "didn't hear no" instead of "didn't hear any." Her daughter nor her husband speak like that, either, so I don't understand why she does, but I didn't allow it to spoil my enjoying the book, and neither should anyone else. In the end, highly recommended.
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