Review: Hail to the Chef

TITLE: HAIL to the CHEF
AUTHOR: JULIE HYZY
PUBLISHER: BERKLEY PRIME CRIME
PUB DATE: DECEMBER 2008
PAGES: 328

Ollie Paras is the new excutive White House Chef, and it's the Thanksgiving Holidays. Added to the ususal holiday bustle, the daily on the job stress and a bomb scare that puts the First Lady, the First Lady's nephew and Ollie together in a secure room complete with makeshift kitchen and soon chaos starts to seem like a way of life.
But to Ollie's dismay her favorite electrician is electrocuted and Ollie doesn't think it was an accident. She thinks it is murder, but before she can truly investigate his death another murder happens. One they are calling suicide and the First Lady isn't buying it. The First Lady's nephew wouldn't kill himself and she enlists the aid of Ollie to help her prove it wasn't murder.
Now if you think your family is dysfunctional then you're in for a treat because the First Lady's family is anything but soically nice. To top this off Ollie is asked to rig the gingerbread man contest for children. None other than a Senator's assistant wants a certain family to win.
To top this off Ollie and her staff are asked to attend safety classes and everyone's schedule has to be worked around these classes.
Needless to say can't even think about her own personal holiday or needs with so much chaos and murder surrounding this holiday season.
HAIL TO THE CHEF is a combination of humor, sadness and true courage. But more than that it's full of flavorful recipes, a tightly woven plot and characters that round out a truly remarkable mystery.
HAIL TO THE CHEF is the second book in this wonderful mystery series and that will be a delight to the palette of every mystery reader. You can't go wrong with a Julie Hyzy Mystery and if you love holiday myseteries don't miss this feast because Ollie Paras is the sweetest, smartest and most sensational sleuth on today's market.
Pamela James **********

Review: Needled To Death

Title: NEEDLED to DEATH
Author: Maggie Sefton
Hard Cover
ISBN:0-7394-6076-5
Mystery SeriesPublisher: Berley Prime Crime


Kelly Flynn loves her new life in Fort Conner, Colorado. She has her work and she has her friends. Life is good and she even has her hobby of knitting. So when Kelly volunteers to take a group of tourists to visit Vickie Claymore's Alpaca Farm to see these special sheep. The last thing on Kelly's mind is that she would find Vickie Claymore's lifeless slain body splayed on the beautiful hand woven rug. The suspects could be anyone from a soon to be ex-husband, close friend or relative but one thing is for sure Kelly has busy hands and a sharp mind. She may not be able to knit her sweater without frogging a few rows but when it comes to murder she can try to right a wrong.

NEEDLED TO DEATH by Maggie Sefton, includes a recipe and a knitting pattern but the most clever part of this book is the plot. Complete with charming characters and a wonderful setting this book is sure to please any mystery reader. ***********

The Subject is Murder

BLOG:

The SUBJECT IS MURDER:

Today suppose you tell us how you like your murder served to you between the pages of a book, on the small screen or the big screen.
Is strangulation your cup of coffee? Is poison your cup of tea? What about a good old fashioned stabbing, maybe you like your murder to end with a souffle gone bad or does your taste of choice end with a big bang?
Here are some movies and books that satisfy my taste for murder.
1. WHOSE KILLING THE GREAT CHEFS OF EUROPE?
2. MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS
3. MIDNIGHT LACE
4. STRANGERS ON A TRAIN
5. ROPE
6. MURDER IS EASY
7. HOSTILE MAKEOVER
8. NOTORIOUS
9. PRESUMED INNOCENT
10. DEATH TRAP
11. The PELICAN BRIEF
12. SUSPECT
Now these are all good movies and I love the ones with a twist ending. Moving on to books here are a few that I thought had clever plots.
1. THREE BEDROOMS ONE CORPSE by Charlaine Harris.
2. FATAL FIXER UPPER by Sarah Graves
3. The BODY IN THE IVY by Katherine Hall Page
4. POISONED PINS by Joan Hess
5. CRY WOLF by Tami Hoag
6. THIS OLD MURDER by Valerie Wolzien
7. MURDER BETWEEN the COVERS by Elaine Viets
8. DEAD MAN'S ISLAND by Carolyn G. Hart
9. DEADLY VALENTINE by Carolyn Hart
10. NEEDLED TO DEATH by Maggie Sefton
I also really like culinary mysteries. You never know what will be served and they always have great recipes that you can try after satisfying your taste for murder. Nothing goes with murder like food except maybe a good bookstore mystery, a library mystery or an historical mystery. Needless to say when it comes to murder everyone's palette is different but it's great we can sample all types......

Until next time........
Learn to make your own fortune cookie!

Pamela's Pen has struck again....

Guest Blogger - Lea Wait

Living in a vacation area (the coast of Maine) has both advantages and disadvantages. I’ve learned to keep clean sheets on the guest beds, hamburger in the freezer, and pots in which to make chowder, cook pasta, and boil lobsters, at the ready. My husband knows every farmers’ market within twenty miles. I try not to have book deadlines between June and September.
But this summer has offered special challenges. It has rained. Almost every day.
Any moment now (yes; it’s raining) we may break the 139 year record for “wettest recorded summer in Maine history.” I’ve had guests who stayed two weeks and never saw the sun.
Now, there are alternatives to outdoor Maine. One of my guest rooms is also my “mystery and suspense room” – two walls of floor-to-ceiling bookcases filled with mysteries. I have VHS and DVD movies. Maine boasts art galleries, craft shops, museums, outlet stores, and innumerable places to buy souvenirs and lobster rolls.
I encourage folks “from away” to partake of all of Maine’s largesse, not just its (now) sodden beaches, foggy cliffs and muddy trails.
Luckily, many of my guests are readers, and curling up with one of the many books in our home – or making a stop at a nearby independent book store for the latest of whatever the particular guest’s literary tastes call for – is not a bad way to spend a vacation, especially if you add a glass of wine (or juice, for younger guests) and the prospect of a lobster salad or some of my husband’s garlic-steamed mussels.
By and large, all have coped well.
But one day two weeks ago -- perhaps it was magic -- the sun appeared. A decision was made quickly. Whale watching! A telephone call. An hour later we were off to sea.
The afternoon was perfect. Just warm enough. Blue sky. And – whales? Two pods; some within yards of the boat. It was magical.
I turned from searching the horizon for yet another whale. A woman was sitting on the deck, leaning against the boat’s cabin, totally oblivious to those excitedly pointing out whales and seals and glorying in the perfect day.
She was reading.
I’m an author; I had to know what the book was. So I peeked. It was a fantasy, Graceling. I’ve read it. And, yes, there is magic there.
I didn’t speak to the woman. But what I wanted to say was, “Sometimes reality is magical, too. The story will be there when this hour is over. The whales, and the scent of the sea, will not. Put down the book, and don’t forget to live your own life.”
But I didn’t. Because there have been times when, I, too, have needed the comfort of a book more than I wanted views of wild waves and the horizon.
And I suspect that’s true of many readers. You, too?

Pamela's XStitch Finish - Snowman by Hinzeit

Guess Blogger - Kate Grilley - In Praise of Magic

IN PRAISE OF MAGIC

by Kate Grilley

I believe in magic. I believe in shooting stars, magic wands, fireflies that wink in the night, things that glow in the dark, wishing on the first star. I believe that magic is the essence of mysteries that widen our eyes, quicken our breath and make us exclaim in wonder and delight, "oh, wow." Magic is all around us.

Most of all I believe in the magic of the written word.

Words can transport us. When I open an Agatha Christie Miss Marple mystery, I'm immediately taken to St. Mary Mead; reading a Sue Henry book I'm in Alaska, or on the road with Maxie and Stretch; Carolyn Hart lets me wallow in Annie Darling's charming bookstore Death on Demand; Charlaine Harris has taught me about the habits of vampires and added new phrases to my vocabulary like "fang banger."

Creating a fictional universe requires a special magic. I believe in the magic of visualization. If I can't close my eyes and see a place, I can't write about it. I need to be able to walk the streets, smell the air, look at the buildings, listen to the residents talk. In my mind I teleport myself into the lives of my characters, a fly on the wall taking notes on everything they do.

In the Kelly Ryan/St. Chris series, I was on home ground. I've lived in the Caribbean for many years and worked at a radio station when I first moved to the tropics. I changed names and places to protect the innocent and keep the local visitor's bureau from gunning for me when I walked down the street. Another reason for using a fictional Caribbean island setting was that in the real world things change...shops come and go, restaurants open and close or change names. By using a fictional setting, I was able to keep things just the way I wanted them and as long as I was consistent, no one could say I got it wrong. Kelly Ryan is a disc jockey on an island radio station, she's divorced, no kids, has a background in theatre, loves cats and kayaking.

I began writing the Peggy Jean Turner/Cobb's Landing series (as Kate Borden) to prove to myself that I could write something different, that I wasn't a "one trick pony" with only one story to tell. At the beginning of the series, Cobb's Landing is a little town in New England that has seen better days. As I described it in "Death of a Tart"..."Cobb’s Landing was the place where most of the residents had been born, grown up and married, but a town their children would be anxious to leave." But, all that changes when Max, the new owner of the Citizen's Bank, arrives with plans to turn Cobb's Landing into Colonial Village, a themed tourist attraction. Peggy Jean (PJ) Turner is a widowed single mother of an eleven year old son Nicky, the mayor of Cobb's Landing (she succeeded her late husband as mayor, and kept getting reelected because no one else wanted the job) and owner of Tom's Tools and Hardware. Peggy embodies the New England virtues of thrift and hard work. Cobb's Landing is a fictional town in a nameless state, but it was inspired by research I'd done on plans for New England colonial settlements. In college I spent a semester reading Henry David Thoreau's "Walden," so when it came to creating Cobb's Landing I felt in a sense that I was going home although I've never lived in New England.

I like writing about strong women and the friendships that sustain and nurture women. Although Kelly has more choices in her life than Peggy, both women are independent, self-reliant and have great women friends.

I hope that readers get out of my books entertainment and a sense of well-being. The cozy mysteries that I write are like little morality plays. Wrongs are righted, the villain is always caught and at the end of each book, once again, all is right in the world. Cozy - or traditional mysteries - are often described as mysteries of manners. Primarily, I write to entertain my readers. I want them to feel that their investment has been time well, and enjoyably, spent. If a little of the magic that enabled me to write the book has been rubbed off on the reader, that's a definite plus.

Magic has power when you believe in it. If you believe in magic, it will enchant your life.

P.S. While writing this blog, I watched one of my favorite movies, "Practical Magic" -- based on one of my favorite books by Alice Hoffman. The book and the movie are pure magic.

-30-

Kate Grilley is the author of the Kelly Ryan/St. Chris Caribbean mysteries "Death Dances to a Reggae Beat," "Death Rides an Ill Wind," and "Death Lurks in the Bush." As Kate Borden, she wrote the Peggy Jean Turner/Cobb's Landing New England mysteries "Death of a Tart," "Death of a Trickster," and "Death of a Turkey." Email: myskatevi@yahoo.com

Customer Service - NOT!

CUSTOMER SERVICE BLOG

Today I'm blogging about the way customer service has changed. In my parents days of customer service. You
called a repairman and he fixed your washer and you paid the bill if it the appliance was not still under warrenty.

Well I have spent the past month in hell not because of my washer breaking down but my internet and phone lines.
I'm now ready to talk about my expierence. It all started Father's Day Weekend when we returned from Kansas City.
I couldn't get on the internet and at first I thought I was having internet problems. Soon I figured out it was a connection
problem. So after calling the phone company every other day for the next two weeks they decided to take us seriously.
The past two weeks went something like this ...
"Let me do some testing and I'll call you back." They call back and say.."Try this, now try this...click this..what does it
say on your screen." We reply with...."It's blank it doesn't say anything." ...she says...."Oh this isn't good but we'll try
this..." and so the story went for a week.

Now the past week they tell us after more endless conversations. "It's your modem, go buy a new modem because
if you buy one through the phone company it will take forever. This person works for the phone company (But never
mind about that), so Frank searches high and low for a modem it has to be an AT&T DSL one. This past Sunday he
finds one by calling the Chanute Wal-mart and he goes out of town to pick it up. Installs the modem it worked until
11:00 Sunday then nothing. Okay he calls during his lunch hour on Monday (By this time he's in meltdown mode)
they tell him to go get new inside lines and phone jacks and install all of that. He does and by Tuesday at lunch
NOTHING so he calls again by his cordless phone and they say "It's got to be the line to the house OR you need
new phones. He says a few things and they get the hint he's not amused by their if,and's or but's. They tell him
they'll be sending a repairman out on Wednesday.
Wednesday: The repairman comes and says it's our new modem, I call Frank and the repairman talks to him. They
come to an understanding and the repairman is packing up to leave after checking all the dianogstics etc when he
pushes a button and we lose everything. He goes back outside and said he finally found the problem one of our lines
was carroided and the only thing holding together was the rusted etc...ends. Then he says because of the way cables
are set up in our area that he must go uptown and flip a switch testing to see if it's the computer line or the phone wires.
He comes up parks up the street and takes a ladder down off the top of the truck. Then he sets up the ladder climbs the
poll across the street this poll hosts the street light and of course a lot main wires etc.. after this he dives up in front of
our house and tells me I need to keep our dog busy while he sets up his ladder. The dog is overly friendly but I manage
to keep her busy and he works on the back pole and lines for a long time. Then he comes in and checks the computer.
VIOLA we now have everything working. This man was professional, focused and even though it took him three hours
and some change it was worth it to have someone who wasn't giving up until the job was done.
HOWEVER I still say there is a murder mystery plot in here somewhere. Now why am I writing this blog today? Because
I want to hear your stories on when appliances, cars, computer, phones, etc.....breakdown. Good or bad let's blog about
your stories.
Pamela