When celebrated tearoom owner Carolyn Prewitt is found at the bottom of her cellar stairs the morning after winning a prestigious national award, the official verdict is swift and tidy: a loose rug, an unfortunate fall, nothing more to be done. Nell Birch, who has been Carolyn's neighbor on Harrow Street for four years and knows better than most what kind of woman kept that cellar, accepts the condolences, keeps her counter running, and says nothing to anyone about the photograph she took from the doorway before the scene was closed — a photograph of a brass hinge with something pale and fine caught in it, something that has no business being there. Carolyn was meticulous about everything. A loose rug was never going to be the answer.
With a small tortoiseshell stray who arrived through the back passage door the morning everything changed and has been making her views on the matter known ever since, and her dry, encyclopedic neighbor Dora supplying twelve years of public records expertise and a thorough appreciation for what happens when things are not properly documented, Nell begins pulling threads that lead from the trade association's judging files to a competitor's long and careful history of formal complaints, a night spent in a local inn with no convincing reason to be there, and a piece of cream lace that matches precisely one apron on Harrow Street. Deputy Sheriff Mira Osten is methodical and fair, but some observations only resolve themselves over a properly steeped pot of rosehip.
Warm, precise, and layered as carefully as a well-sourced blend, Rosehip Revenge is the sixth book in the Teapot Tails series — a cozy mystery for anyone who believes that professional pride is one of the oldest motives there is, that the most revealing evidence is the kind that clings to what it touched, and that a clever woman, a watchful stray, and a pot of rosehip tea are more than equal to finding out what really happened on an award-winning Tuesday morning.
Genre: Cozy Mystery
With a small tortoiseshell stray who arrived through the back passage door the morning everything changed and has been making her views on the matter known ever since, and her dry, encyclopedic neighbor Dora supplying twelve years of public records expertise and a thorough appreciation for what happens when things are not properly documented, Nell begins pulling threads that lead from the trade association's judging files to a competitor's long and careful history of formal complaints, a night spent in a local inn with no convincing reason to be there, and a piece of cream lace that matches precisely one apron on Harrow Street. Deputy Sheriff Mira Osten is methodical and fair, but some observations only resolve themselves over a properly steeped pot of rosehip.
Warm, precise, and layered as carefully as a well-sourced blend, Rosehip Revenge is the sixth book in the Teapot Tails series — a cozy mystery for anyone who believes that professional pride is one of the oldest motives there is, that the most revealing evidence is the kind that clings to what it touched, and that a clever woman, a watchful stray, and a pot of rosehip tea are more than equal to finding out what really happened on an award-winning Tuesday morning.
Genre: Cozy Mystery
Used availability for Hailey Hartley's Rosehip Revenge