"Murder Spills The Tea" by Vicki Delany

Vicki Delany's third Tea by the Sea cozy mystery has been released, and Murder Spills The Tea is my favorite in the series so far. The popular "America Bakes!" cooking show is coming to town, and Lily Roberts's Cape Cod tearoom, Tea by the Sea, will be competing with other local bakers to see who can wow the judges. Lily doesn't actually want to be in the competition, but her best friend and her grandmother persuade her to sign up anyway, so when Hollywood comes calling, Lily is less than impressed and simply hopes to survive the ordeal with her tearoom and her sanity intact.

The judges on the TV show are familiar characters: the nasty gent with the huge fan following, the airhead beauty queen, the beloved cookbook author. But when a judge goes over the top by tripping one of Lily's employees just to get a rise out of her during taping of the show, Lily and her colleagues are ready to see the taillights of those TV trucks. Before they can hit the road, though, one of the judges is found dead in the kitchen of the tearoom, and two of the tearoom employees quickly become prime suspects.

Delany does a phenomenal job of keeping us guessing who the killer is in this tale. So many people had a reason to want the victim out of the picture, and when the killer was revealed, I was surprised. And while I don't think I've ever heard of a TV cooking competition that included a tearoom offering up its best treats, I do think, after reading this book, that it's a splendid idea, and Delany certainly makes it a believable one.

Review copy courtesy of NetGalley