The Crime Brulee Bake Off by Rebecca Connolly
Summer is a great time to read cozy mysteries – they are light-hearted, quick reads with interesting and usually quirky characters. You can relax and be entertained whether you are on a beach, in the shade, or taking advantage of the air conditioning.
Rebecca Connolly’s foray into the genre, the Claire Walker series, starts with The Crime Brulee Bake Off. Claire is a history teacher who loves to bake. In fact her education degree was obtained so she could pay the bills while working on her passion.
In pursuit of her dream to be a baker, she applied to be a contestant on Britain’s Battle of the Bakers. Once one of Great Britain’s most watched series, the audience seems to be losing interest. But it is Claire’s favorite show and she gladly went through all the applications, preliminary bakes, and psychological testing. Now she is waiting for a phone call. When the call comes, Claire‘s first reaction is panic but she has 8 weeks to calm down and work on her recipes before filming begins.
Producers are hoping that having the contest at a grand historic home will renew interest. The setting will be the estate of Jonathan Ainsley, an investment banker. He is the seventeenth Viscount Colburn of Blackfirth Park and the surrounding village.
Jonny, as his family calls him, thinks it is utterly bizarre that a reality program wants to use a historic home but he agreed. Taking care of and preserving the huge estate for future generations is expensive and this money will certainly help.
The filming and baking will take place in a pavilion and the historic kitchens and mill. Other than background shots, the home itself is off limits and the grumpy viscount (as the local village calls him) wants it that way.
Given the setting, the theme for the season is historic bakes. The show consists of two judges, two hosts, nine contestants, and a historian to make sure the ingredients used would have been available before 1900.
A segment consists of two bakes, Classic and Occasion, with a different theme for each week. All of the contestants are encouraged to explore the historic kitchens and mill even though they won’t be used for baking, just for filming.
With the first bake done, Claire is doing just that when she runs into the viscount in the mill. Out for a stroll, Jonny is surprised to find Claire but soon finds himself agreeing to provide her information and taking a sudden interest in baking.
After the second bake of the first episode, Claire and a couple of her fellow bakers are talking about their efforts when they realize the baker with the most impressive first two bakes, Lesley, is missing. Thinking she may have gone for a walk, they set out to look for her. Claire finds her at the mill.
Lesley has been murdered. The manner of death is eerily similar to the death of the tenth viscount’s wife. Her death was never solved and the local legend that grew out of the unsolved crime is a source of irritation for Jonny.
The local police force is small and this will be the first murder investigation for Detective Watson. It would seem that the murderer is someone very familiar with the local legend and the details of that first murder. But Watson is unsure how to proceed and he asks for Claire and Jonny’s input.
With the producer adamant about continuing to film, Claire will have access to the other bakers who must be considered as suspects. Jonny is willing to help as he’ll get to spend more time with Claire.
Then another contestant is attacked. Solving the crime becomes imperative. Can they find the culprit before there are no bakers left?
This one definitely fits the light-hearted read category and it is amusing. Claire uses baking terms in place of swear words so you never know what she’ll say next. It has romance and like most baking cozies, you’ll find recipes at the end.
Both this title and the just released second in the series are in the large print collection at the library. Read-alikes for this series are Darci Hannah’s Beacon Bakeshop mysteries and Sarah Graves’ Death by Chocolate series.
Review by Patty Crane, Reference Librarian
