It's All About the Book

Family, Food & Drink, Magical, New Releases, World Literature

Restaurant of Lost Recipes by Hisashi Kashiwai

November 14, 2024November 13, 2024 Patricia McDonald Uttaro

Description

We all hold lost recipes in our hearts. A very special restaurant in Kyoto helps find them . . .

Tucked away down a Kyoto backstreet lies the extraordinary Kamogawa Diner, run by Chef Nagare and his daughter, Koishi. The father-daughter duo have reinvented themselves as “food detectives,” offering a service that goes beyond cooking mouth-watering meals. Through their culinary sleuthing, they revive lost recipes and rekindle forgotten memories.

From the Olympic swimmer who misses his estranged father’s bento lunchbox to the one-hit-wonder pop star who remembers the tempura she ate to celebrate her only successful record, each customer leaves the diner forever changed—though not always in the ways they expect . . .

The Kamogawa Diner doesn’t just serve meals—it’s a door to the past through the miracle of delicious food. A beloved bestseller in Japan, The Restaurant of Lost Recipes is a tender and healing novel for fans of Before the Coffee Gets Cold.

My Thoughts

What an absolute gem of a book! The concept is fascinating – a restaurant and chef that recreate recipes from your past. We all have some dish that evokes special and strong memories – maybe a memorable meal you had with a loved one, or, like the first dish in this story, a simple (or not-so-simple) lunch made for you by your parent every day for years.

The power of food and taste is explored in delicate and colorful prose, offering up poignant and heart-warming vignettes for the people who are lucky enough to find the Kamagawa Diner. This would make a wonderful TV series. I hope Netflix picks it up.

What is YOUR “lost recipe?”

Publication Date: October 8, 2024
Published By: Penguin Group Putnam
Thanks to Netgalley for the advanced copy

Book Tour, Mystery, Partners In Crime

Death in the Ozarks by Erik S. Meyers

November 12, 2024November 11, 2024 Patricia McDonald Uttaro

November 11 – December 20, 2024
Virtual Book Tour

Description

A cross between Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple and a Cheers bartender, Sally Witherspoon, a 50-something accountant turned biker-bar owner, loves solving puzzles. Up to now, she has focused on helping neighbors and friends find lost jewelry, lost pets, and lost loves.

But when she finds her best friend and business partner, Bill Arnold, dead in a dumpster behind her bar on a Saturday night, she needs all her wits and grit to find out who did it.

And she won’t stop until she does.

My Thoughts

Sally Witherspoon is very different from the typical amateur detective you find in most cozy mysteries. She’s older, a bit rough around the edges, worldly, and living life on her own terms. This is a welcome change from the spunky, quirky young women found in many modern mysteries – in one of those, Sally would be the odd auntie driving around town in a vintage car getting into mischief.

Here, Sally shines. She’s gruff and no-nonsense, but loves her people and her place in the world. The mystery is more “Law & Order” style than “Hallmark Channel” and the murder is a bit gritty. The relationships that are key to Sally’s life shine here, and there is plenty of emotion and humor as well as mystery.

I was reminded more than once of Joan Hess’ Maggody mystery series, and in a good way. I’ll be recommending this series for sure.

Book Details:

Genre: Traditional Mystery, Cozy Mystery
Published by: Level Best Books
Purchase Links: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | BookShop.org | Goodreads

Shortlinks:

Author Bio:

Currently in Austria, Erik S. Meyers is an American abroad for years and years who has lived or worked in six countries on three continents, spending the longest time in Germany. He is an award-winning author and communications professional with over twenty-five years of expertise in a variety of corporate roles. Reading and writing are his passions, when he is not hiking one of the amazing trails in Austria or elsewhere.

Mystery, Partners In Crime

A Hush at Midnight by Marlene M. Bell

November 11, 2024November 11, 2024 Patricia McDonald Uttaro

October 7 – November 1, 2024
Virtual Book Tour

**From the award-winning author of the ANNALISSE MYSTERY SERIES.**

THE VISIT THAT CHANGES EVERYTHING.

Celebrity chef Laura Harris dwells on the horror of finding her mentor’s body in the groundskeeper’s disheveled bed—pillow and bedding half covering her open eyes—purple bruising around her mouth. A grisly snapshot in time revealing the Texas woman’s last moments during her attack. The elderly matriarch from the small town of Stenburg has left the physical world, and Laura is shattered.

She is catapulted headlong into the pursuit of a casual executioner, one bold enough to come and go from the crime scene with ease, dropping bizarre crumb trails designed to mock the deceased. But Laura herself doesn’t go unnoticed. As she digs deeper, she is followed and bombarded by warnings to leave the state.

When the victim’s attorney informs Laura that she’s to inherit the entire Stenburg fortune, the last act of kindness has made Laura the main person of interest in the investigation.

Message by message, Laura is methodically taunted by someone so deranged and driven they’ll do whatever it takes to dislodge Laura from Texas – permanently.

My Thoughts

Bell has delivered a taut, suspense-filled tale full of intrigue, betrayal, and surprises. The characters are both engaging and despicable, the plot well-constructed, and the descriptive narrative of the Texas landscape beautifully done.

Complicated relationships abound, as do strong women characters who drive the action of the story forward to its exciting conclusion. The relationship between Laura and Hattie and the suspicion that falls on Laura after Hattie’s death is the stuff that makes a gripping story and Bell deftly leads the reader through some twists and turns. Fans of harder-edged domestic suspense will thoroughly enjoy this one.

Book Details:

Genre: Amateur Sleuth/Mystery/Cozy Mystery
Published by: Ewephoric Publishing
Publication Date: October 1, 2024
Number of Pages: 368
ISBN: 979-8-9863409-6-8
Book Links: Amazon | Goodreads

Shortlinks:

Author’s Website   https://pictbooks.tours/sywjz
Goodreads   https://Pict books.tours/BZhYK
BookBub   https://pictbooks.tours/pRMCn
Instagram   https://pictbooks.tours/3nZa9
Twitter   https://pictbooks.tours/9ivZk
Facebook – Author   https://pictbooks.tours/jFZCa
Amazon Author Page   https://pictbooks.tours/AVTZV

Retailers:
Amazon –   https://pictbooks.tours/FFAHA
Goodreads –   https://pictbooks.tours/Dp80f

Author Bio:

Marlene M. Bell has never met a sheep she didn’t like. As a personal touch for her readers, they often find these wooly creatures visiting her international romantic mysteries and children’s books as characters or subject matter. Marlene is an accomplished artist and photographer who takes pride in entertaining fans on multiple levels of her creativity.

Marlene’s award-winning Annalisse series boasts Best Mystery honors for all installments including these: IP Best Regional Australia/New Zealand, Global Award Best Mystery, and Chanticleer’s International Mystery and Mayhem shortlist for Copper Waters, the fourth mystery in the series.

She offers her children’s picture book, Mia and Nattie: One Great Team! written primarily for younger kids based on true events from the Bell’s East Texas sheep ranch. The simple text and illustrations are a touching tribute of belonging and unconditional love between a little girl and her lamb.

Book Tour, Cozy, Mystery, Partners In Crime

Color Me Dead by Teresa Trent

October 22, 2024October 21, 2024 Patricia McDonald Uttaro

October 14 – November 8
Virtual Book Tour

Description

Artist Gabby Wolfe has the ability to see not only the beauty of the living but the despair of the dead. When she returns to her childhood home in Henry Park Colorado, she is forced to bring along her younger brother Mitch. He is on a “break” from college where he was majoring in wine, women, and song. If that isn’t enough they also have Mitch’s rambunctious beagle Luigi along who prefers to spend his days wallowing in junk food. When Gabby draws the death of a young woman before it happens, she knows she must tell someone and risk a new job and her professional credibility. Will she reveal her secret in time to save the woman in the water or will it be too late?

My Thoughts

Fans of lighthearted but inventive mysteries with a touch of the supernatural will enjoy this offering from Teresa Trent. Gabby, Mitch, and (of course!) Luigi make a memorable trio as they move back to a childhood home but find themselves right in the middle of an emotional mess.

Trent builds some nice relationships throughout the story which help settle Gabby’s place in Henry Park and suggest the possibility of future entries in a series. Gabby’s paranormal ability is interesting – I’ve only seen the concept of drawing the future done in one other book that I recall, so this was an entertaining element added to the mix of mystery and a little romance.

Clocking in at just under 250 pages, this one makes a very pleasant afternoon reading experience. Recommended

Book Details

Genre: Paranormal Cozy Mystery
Published by: Harbor Lane Books
Publication Date: September 24, 2024
Number of Pages: 260
Book Links: Amazon | Goodreads

Book Shortlinks

Author Bio

Teresa Trent started out teaching English, but life and children intervened and she began writing mysteries starting with her Pecan Bayou Cozy Mystery Series. After that, she wrote the Piney Woods and the Swinging Sixties Mystery Series. Color Me Dead is the first book in her new Henry Park Series and while all her other books take place in Texas, this series is set in Colorado, where Teresa grew up. Teresa is also the author of several short stories and is teaching writing at her local library encouraging new writers. Teresa lives in Houston, Texas with her husband and son.

Mystery, Psychological, Suspense, Women

The Blue Hour by Paula Hawkins

October 17, 2024October 17, 2024 Patricia McDonald Uttaro

Description

Welcome to Eris: an island with only one house, one inhabitant, one way out. Unreachable from the Scottish mainland for twelve hours each day.

Once home to Vanessa: A famous artist whose notoriously unfaithful husband disappeared twenty years ago.

Now home to Grace: A solitary creature of the tides, content in her own isolation.

But when a shocking discovery is made in an art gallery far away in London, a visitor comes calling.

And the secrets of Eris threaten to emerge….

A masterful novel that is as page-turning as it is unsettling, The Blue Hour recalls the sophisticated suspense of Shirley Jackson and Patricia Highsmith and cements Hawkins’s place among the very best of our most nuanced and stylish storytellers.

My Thoughts

Paula Hawkins’ latest is a grip-the-book-so-hard-your-fingers-hurt kind of story. The premise is fascinating – the work of a deceased famous artist is discovered to contain a human bone and it just so happens her philandering husband disappeared from her remote island home years ago. Could it be him?

The story follows an inquisitive curator as he navigates the treacherous terrain of that island, now inhabited by the artist’s companion of many years and executor of her estate. While the outcome was apparent to me pretty early in the story, the tension Hawkins builds as she weaves the stories of both Vanessa and Grace becomes almost unbearable at times, and the ending! Oh, the ambiguous ending! Definitely the stuff made for book clubs to debate!

Hawkins is getting better and better at taking old tropes and breathing new life into them. As I read this, I was reminded of both And Then There Were None for the isolation and Misery for the core relationship driving the story, but Hawkins has made both her very own.

Readers who are triggered by domestic violence should be aware that is an integral part of this story. This will be one of the hot books of the Fall for sure.

Advanced Praise

“The best Paula Hawkins yet – by a tense and haunting mile.” – Lee Child

“An atmospheric, stylish puzzle box of a thriller… truly exceptional.” – Liz Moore, New York Times bestselling author of The God of the Woods

“A masterful exploration of the nature of obsession…I loved it.” – Angie Kim, New York Times bestselling author of Happiness Falls and Miracle Creek

The propulsive and powerful new novel from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Girl on the Train

Publication Date: October 29, 2024
Published By: Mariner Books
Thanks to Netgalley and the Publisher for the review copies

Book Tour, Mystery, Partners In Crime, Suspense

Autumn Embers by Tina deBellegarde

October 15, 2024October 15, 2024 Patricia McDonald Uttaro

October 14 – November 8, 2024
Virtual Book Tour
A Batavia-on-Hudson Mystery

Bianca St. Denis travels to Kyoto to return a priceless artifact recovered in Batavia-on-Hudson during last summer’s flood. It’s late October and the city of 2,000 shrines is in full autumn splendor. While she’s in Japan’s ancient capital, Bianca visits with her son, a student at Kyoto University. Ian shows her the sights and introduces her to his circle of friends—his chosen family.

On the night of her welcome party, Bianca thinks she witnesses a struggle in the garden, perhaps even a murder. When the police investigate and find no body, she is stumped yet alarm bells won’t stop ringing. She knows she’s witnessed something.

When a dead body surfaces and suspicion falls on her son, Bianca’s maternal instincts spring to action to protect Ian and clear his name. Meanwhile, things in Batavia-on-Hudson are tense. Sheriff Mike Riley is losing his re-election bid while tackling devastating news about his dead partner, and wavering about his troubled marriage.

Autumn Embers explores the malleable nature of our identities and reminds us that chosen families can be stronger than we think, and that true friendship can bridge any distance.

My Thoughts

As an Upstate New Yorker and loyal mystery reader, I have gravitated to deBellegarde’s Batavia-on-Hudson series and thoroughly enjoyed each one. She has built an engaging series featuring characters who become more complex with each book, especially Bianca who is navigating an entirely new world following the death of her beloved husband.

Autumn Embers is a bit harder-edged than previous entries in the series, bringing in more unsavory elements of the mystery/suspense genre like police corruption and organized crime. This seems to be a natural evolution for Bianca and Mike as they both grapple with major changes and challenges to their lives.

The plot here is intriguing, with deBellegarde delivering two stories of challenges – one with Bianca in Japan and one with Mike in Batavia-on-Hudson. The stories are very different but extremely unsettling for both characters and are delivered with wit and cleverness. The insights into Bianca’s relationship with her son and Mike’s past are woven into the larger story seamlessly.

The author secures her place among the best of New York State mystery authors with this one. Recommended.

Book Details:

Genre: Female Amateur Sleuth
Published by: Level Best Books
Publication Date: September 17, 2024
Number of Pages: 321
Series: A Batavia-on-Hudson Mystery, 3
Book Links: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | BookShop | Goodreads

Book Shortlinks:

Author Bio:

Tina deBellegarde’s debut novel, Winter Witness, was nominated for an Agatha Award for Best First Novel. Dead Man’s Leap, her second book in the Batavia-on-Hudson Mystery series, was nominated for an Agatha Award for Best Contemporary Novel. Reviewers have called Tina “the Louise Penny of the Catskills.” Tina also writes short stories and flash fiction. Her story “Tokyo Stranger,” nominated for a Derringer Award, appears in the Mystery Writers of America anthology When a Stranger Comes to Town edited by Michael Koryta. Tina co-chairs the Murderous March Conference and is a founding member of Sleuths and Sidekicks, where she blogs, tours virtually, and teaches writing workshops. She is a member of Writers in Kyoto and reviews books for BooksOnAsia.net. She lives in Catskill, New York with her husband Denis and their cat Shelby. She travels frequently to Japan to visit her son and daughter-in-law and to do research. Tina is currently working on a collection of interconnected short stories based in Japan.

Catch Up With Tina deBellegarde:
www.TinadeBellegarde.com
www.SleuthsAndSidekicks.com
Goodreads
BookBub – @tinadebellegarde
Instagram – @tdb_writes
Threads – @tdb_writes
Twitter/X – @tdbwrites
Facebook – @tinadebellegardeauthor

1000 Islands, Mystery, Suspense, Uncategorized

The Coldest Case by Tessa Wegert

October 12, 2024October 7, 2024 Patricia McDonald Uttaro

Description

News of a missing Instagram celebrity brings Senior Investigator Shana Merchant to a frozen island community of just eight people. When the visit turns deadly, her hunt for a killer collides with a cold case she’ll never forget . . .

It’s February in the Thousand Islands and, cut off from civilization by endless ice, eight people are overwintering on tiny, remote Running Pine. Six year-rounders, used to the hard work, isolation and freezing temperatures . . . and two newcomers: social-media stars Cary and Sylvie, whose account documenting their year on the island is garnering thousands of followers, and thousands of dollars’ worth of luxury gifts.

The long-term islanders will tell you Running Pine can be perilous – especially for city slickers who’ll do anything to get the perfect shot. So when Cary doesn’t return from ice fishing one morning, his neighbors fear the worst.

With the clock ticking to find the missing influencer, a police team are dispatched to take the dangerous journey to the island . . . but Sylvie, his frantic partner, will only talk to one person: newlywed Senior Investigator Shana Merchant.

Where is Cary – and what is it that Sylvie’s not sharing? With aspects of the case reminding Shana of an unsolved homicide from her past that haunts her still, she risks her own safety to help. But little does she know that a storm is coming – and if she doesn’t solve both crimes soon, she may become the island’s next victim . . .

The latest taut, thrilling small-town mystery featuring New York State senior investigator Shana Merchant, and set against the beautiful backdrop of the Thousand Islands, is perfect for fans of Agatha Christie and Ruth Ware.

My Thoughts

A solid entry in Wegert’s Shana Merchant series, fans will eat this up and readers new to the series will want to go back and read the earlier entries, which are:

Death in the Family
The Dead Season
Dead Wind
The Kind to Kill
Devils at the Door

As a New Yorker who spends a lot of time in the NYS North County, I adore Wegert’s settings in and around Alexandria Bay and the 1000 Islands, and this one is no different. Fans of fast-paced, semi-hard-hitting police procedurals will enjoy the ice-covered ride of this story.

Publication Date: November 5, 2024
Published By: Severn House
Thanks to Netgalley for the review copy

British, Mystery, Short Stories

The Man in Black by Elly Griffiths

October 8, 2024August 20, 2024 Patricia McDonald Uttaro

Description

Elly Griffiths has always written short stories to experiment with different voices and genres as well as to explore what some of her fictional creations such as Ruth Galloway, Harbinder Kaur, and Max Mephisto might have done outside of the novels. The Man in Black gathers these bite-sized tales all together in one splendid volume. There are ghost stories, cozy mysteries, tales of psychological suspense, and poignant vignettes of love and loss.

In the title story, Ruth Galloway crosses paths with a mysterious man in a bookstore, setting in motion a rescue mission that hinges on the legends and lore of Norfolk. Looking into the past, a young magician in 1920s Leeds wonders just what happened to his missing landlady in “Max Mephisto and the Disappearing Act.” In “Justice Jones and the Etherphone,” a witty girl detective investigates the dire prediction of a fortune teller in dreary postwar London. A flashback in time reveals Harbinder Kaur as a Detective Sergeant surviving her first day on the job at Shoreham DCI. To celebrate the holidays, Ruth gets her very first Christmas tree, and her beloved cat narrates his own seasonal story in “Flint’s Fireside Tale.”

The Man in Black illustrates the breadth and variety of Elly Griffiths’s talent for blood-chilling, page-turning stories all with her trademark humor and heart.

My Thoughts

I’m not sure exactly what I expected in this short story collection from Elly Griffiths, but I found an absolute treasure of a reading experience. This book is filled with lovely vignettes, some featuring characters well-known to Griffiths’ fans and others completely new.

I got the sense that some of these were written as exercises as she was planning out some of her books because many felt like there was more to the story. The inclusion of local folklore was especially interesting (a favorite is the St. Lucia Day story). All of the disparate parts come together smoothly in a collection of stories that feels like a hug from the author. Fans of Griffiths work will certainly enjoy this one.

Publication Date: October 15, 2024
Published By: Mariner Books
Thanks to Netgalley for the review copy

Lists, Spooky Season

Spooky Season

October 4, 2024 Patricia McDonald Uttaro

There are many lists out there right now full of spooky season reading recommendations, but I thought I would share some of my favorites from over the years of writing this blog. Some are true ghost stories, some lean into supernatural horror, some are horrifying mysteries, and some are science fiction horror. I hope you find some good ones that you might have missed in previous years!