Genre: Mystery
Mass Market Paperback; Digital Book
ISBN #: 9781496722775
Kensington Publishing
304 Pages
$7.99; $7.59 Amazon
December 1, 2020
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Despite a few early hiccups, Courtney is thrilled with her starring role on The American Baking Battle, filmed at a grand resort in the Pocono Mountains. The icing on the cake? The new season has a wedding theme -- complete with formal wear. But the first day on the set, the producer seems to care more about profits than pastry -- and the topper comes when her cohost Skylar falls ill. Little does she know things are about to end in tiers...
When a barely coherent, blood-covered Skylar is discovered at the doorway of his room, Courtney is horrified to walk inside and find a towering wedding cake -- thoroughly smashed by the body of a woman in a bridal gown. Now suspicion is filling the studio and falling on Skylar, and Courtney has to look at coworkers and contestants, working through layers of deception to find the real culprit...
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When Courtney Archer, host of the television show Cooking with the Farmer's Daughter, decides to come clean with her fans about her real background she knows it might change her career or get her cancelled. But that stress isn't even in comparison to the stress surrounding her appearance as cohost of the show The American Baking Battle, now in its second season. The show went over budget last time because of a murder, so the producer is on hand and making everyone miserable with his changes and demands. To make things worse, she's been assigned a bodyguard from the security company - a woman who seems to have a personal interest in Courtney's own producer Eric - and it's thrown her into a tizzy wondering what's going on inside her.
But then she and Shannon, one of the judges on the show, find Skylar, Courtney's cohost, incoherent in his room and covered in blood. When she discovers a dead woman on top of a cake, questions abound about what happened. One thing Courtney knows for sure is that no matter where the evidence leads, Skylar would not have killed the woman. But the question remains: who did?
This is the second book in the series and I have to say that I enjoyed it quite as much as the first. The characters' dialogue is witty and fun, they care about each other and are pleased to be working with one another. Courtney, while trying to do her job, has an innate curiosity that wants to get to the bottom of things. But of course being fought in every direction by the sheriff and the security team, she needs to keep her questions to herself and find answers wherever she can. Unfortunately, it also puts her front and center as the next victim.
While I knew who the murderer was early on, it never took away from anything going on within the story. Honestly, with all the other action -- especially the filming of the show -- it kept things moving right along and I got caught up in wondering who would be sent home next. I also loved the description of many of the recipes (oh, how I wish some of them were added so I could try them - I love to cook and bake - but I digress). At any rate, we get to see how busy Courtney is, and not only is she trying to find out who framed Skylar, but she has two shows to film - and who knows how long either of them will be around - so we have that question going on along with the murder.
When things start coming together, we see that Courtney is a woman who can think on her feet, which I really like, and while she doesn't deliberately put herself in danger, once she's there she immediately tries to find a way out of it. But I absolutely loved the ending. However, I will add one caveat: these books should be read in order, because in this one the author does mention details of the murder in the first one several times.
The author has given us a new series with a (hopefully) bright promise and I really wish I could delve into the next book right now. Highly recommended.
More on Rosemarie Ross's Books: https://www.fantasticfiction.com/r/rosemarie-ross/
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