An Eggnog to Die For (A Cape Cod Foodie Mystery, Band 2) - Softcover

Pershing, Amy

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0593199162 ISBN 13: 9780593199169

Verlag: Berkley, 2021

Inhaltsangabe

Christmas is coming to Cape Cod, but when Sam Barnes finds a very dead Santa in a very hip restaurant, it’s up to her to sift out suspects who have been naughty vs. nice….

Professional foodie Samantha Barnes has a simple Christmas list: a quiet holiday at home with her dog and a certain handsome harbor master; no embarrassing viral videos; and no finding dead bodies. Unfortunately she’s got family visiting, she’s spending a lot of time in front of the camera, and she’s just stumbled over the lifeless body of the town’s Santa Claus.
 
Plus, Sam’s plans for Christmas Eve are getting complicated.  There’s the great eggnog debate among her very opinionated guests.  There’s the “all edible” Christmas tree to decorate.  And there’s her Feast of the Five Fishes prepare. Nonetheless, Sam finds herself once again in the role of sleuth. She needs to find out who slayed this Santa—but can she pull off a perfect feast and nab a killer?

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Amy Pershing, who spent every summer of her childhood on Cape Cod, was an editor, a restaurant reviewer and a journalist before sitting down to write the Cape Cod Foodie Mystery series, including A Side of Murder -- which Elizabeth Gilbert called “the freshest, funniest mystery I have ever read” -- and An Eggnog to Die For  -- which Kirkus Reviews gave a starred review, saying, "A delightful sleuth, a complex mystery, and lovingly described cuisine: a winner for both foodies and mystery mavens." The third book in the series, Murder Is No Picnic, will be published in the summer of 2022.

 

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one

"They want to call it Santa's Seashore Selebration," Jenny said, spearing a succulent morsel of lamb tagine from my plate and plopping it into her mouth. "Mmmm, yummy," she said, reaching over again.

I smacked her hand away. "Keep your mitts off my tagine," I said. "You've already eaten your own entire"-

I glanced at the menu again-"Marhaba Meat Extravaganza."

This was true. Jenny had polished off a generous sampling of the barbequed kufta meatballs, a lamb and beef gyro, and three grilled baby lamb chops. Which hadn't surprised me. Jenny Snow Singleton, whom I'd known since we were Minnows together in swimming lessons, is a confirmed meat eater. She was loving the Marhaba, a tiny Middle Eastern restaurant with a menu designed to please everyone from the dedicated omnivore to the most devoted vegetarian.

"That's not fair, Sam," Jenny protested loudly. "You had some of everything on my plate."

"I'm supposed to have some of everything on your plate," I said, lowering my voice to just above a whisper. "I'm the restaurant reviewer."

For the past six months or so, I'd been critiquing restaurants for the Cape Cod Clarion. Not that I did much actual critiquing. If I tried a place and it was truly not very good, I simply didn't review it. I wanted no part of trashing someone else's dream. But if a place had promise, was doing its business honestly and with passion, I was happy to tell the world (or at least our little corner of Cape Cod) about it.

Truth be told, I wasn't sure how much longer I'd be able to get away with this gig. A large part of reviewing restaurants depends on the anonymity essential to an honest review. Anonymity, however, has never been my strong suit. First of all, I stand well over six feet tall, so I'm kind of hard to miss. Second, I have an awkward history of going viral online.

Through no fault of my own, I might add. Was it my fault that someone posted online a very unfortunate video they'd taken with their cell phone of me, Samantha Barnes, up-and-coming New York chef, mixing it up with my rather volatile chef husband in a kind of chefs' fencing match? (Which I won, I might add. My knife skills were always better than his. Which is why he is now missing the tip of his pinky finger.) Once that video hit YouTube, I almost instantaneously became Samantha Barnes, ex-chef.

So when I found I'd inherited my Aunt Ida's house on the Cape, I reluctantly retreated home to Fair Harbor, where my old friend and now publisher of the Clarion, Krista Baker, gave me a job writing restaurant reviews. And, much against my better judgment, I had allowed Krista to talk me into a series of video food features for the Clarion's online edition, starring yours truly as "the Cape Cod Foodie." The good news is that they've been something of a hit. The bad news is that they've been something of a hit.

So, though I still wasn't sure what I wanted to be when I grew up, I was making ends meet as the Cape Cod Foodie and the Clarion's restaurant reviewer.

And now Jenny was blowing whatever cover I had left by arguing with me. Loudly.

I looked in mute appeal to my other fellow diners, Helene Greenberg and Miles Tanner, willing them to distract Jenny from my falling-off-the-bone, meltingly delicious lamb and to keep her voice down. Miles, an old high school buddy and dedicated organic farmer, was too busy spooning the sinfully rich yogurt labneh over his falafel to notice, but Helene, my sixtysomething next door neighbor and the town librarian, jumped in, bless her heart.

"So tell me about this Santa seashore celebration," Helene said, as she dipped a piece of pita into her eggplant baba ghanoush with one beringed hand.

Jenny grinned at her. "'Celebration' with an s," she said.

Helene shuddered. Librarians as a rule don't like cute misspellings. "I'm assuming that the celebrating"-she pronounced it "ssssselebrating"-"is mainly about buying stuff?"

Helene has no illusions about people's motivations. That's what happens after twenty-five years as a legal psychologist with the Manhattan DA's office.

"Well, sure," Jenny said. "I mean, according to the select board, the whole point this year is to bring in some extra tourist dollars during the off-season. You know how usually we just have Santa come through town on a fire truck and throw candy canes to the kids? Well, this year, there's going to be a Santa Trolley to take people around to all the stores, and everybody gets a wish list to fill out and give to their significant others. And the kids, of course, get to tell Santa what they want."

Miles dabbed some rogue yogurt off his beard. "But there's other fun stuff, too," he said defensively. Miles is the optimist yin to Helene's pessimist yang. "I'm personally looking forward to the pancake breakfast hosted by Mrs. Claus . . ."

"Archaic and sexist," Helene muttered to herself.

"And the 5K Santa Stroll, where all you have to do to qualify is wear a Santa hat. You don't even have to run, just walk. And the best Santa lookalike wins."

Miles stroked his bushy beard and beamed at his considerable paunch. "I'm gonna win," he said with all the complacent pride of the five-year-old he still was deep inside. "I have the whole outfit. I've been playing Santa for my sister's kids like forever."

This, I knew, was no exaggeration. Miles's sister had been popping out kids at a rate of one every two years for the past ten years and showed no sign of slowing down.

"So why aren't you playing the town's Santa?" I asked.

"Apparently the role had been filled," Miles responded with great dignity, "by Caleb Mayo, the latest member of the Fair Harbor select board."

"Santa is always played by someone from the select board," Jenny explained. "They rotate. Last year it was Monique Holden. She was terrific. Very jolly. That's going to be a tough act for Caleb Mayo to follow. On the other hand, he'll be the first Santa to arrive at Town Cove by boat."

"I like that," I said, imagining a red-suited Father Christmas chugging in at the helm of a fishing boat to the delighted cheers of the Fair Harbor citizenry.

"Ah, I'm not sure you will, actually," Jenny said, her blue eyes dancing with mischief. I groaned. Jenny in a mischievous mood is not someone I trust.

"The boat is going to be the Harbor Patrol's Grady-White," she continued. The Grady-White is the Harbor Patrol's main powerboat. I know this because my gentleman friend, as my Aunt Ida would have called him, is Jason Captiva, the town's harbormaster.

"Why wouldn't I like that?"

"Well, the Grady-White is going to be piloted by Jason," Jenny said, and left a significant pause.

I stepped right into her trap. "That's fine. How is that a problem?"

"It will be piloted by Jason wearing an elf costume," Jenny said gleefully. "An elf costume with red-striped stockings and curly-toed shoes!"

Jason in an elf costume. That would not be fine. That would be something I could never unsee. Jason was hot to death, but even he could not pull off red-striped stockings and curly-toed shoes.

I was so stunned, I didn't even notice Jenny snatching another huge forkful of tagine off my plate.

"Sam, Sam, sweetheart, is that you?"

What I sort of wanted to say was, Who did you think was going to answer my phone that you called? Because I'm snarky that way. But I love my mother, most of the time anyway, so I didn't.

Instead, I said, "Hi, Mom. Yeah, it's me."

"Hi, sweetheart. Hold on a minute while I put you on speaker. Your dad is here, too." I'm not sure if my mother knows that she can actually put her phone on speaker before she calls, thus minimizing the chance that she will press the wrong button and cut the call off completely. This happens often. But not this time, miraculously.

My father's voice came booming in my ear....

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Berkley
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2021
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0593199162
• ISBN 13: 9780593199169
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 320
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Nicht verfügbar