A Smoking Bun - A Bakeshop Mystery #18

 

A Smoking Bun is the is the eighteenth Bakeshop cozy mystery by prolific author Ellie Alexander. Due out 20th Feb 2024 from Macmillan on their St. Martin's imprint, it's 320 pages and will be available in mass market paperback, audio, and ebook formats. It's worth noting that the ebook format has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links and references throughout.

This installment sees the crew at Torte heading into the mountains for snowshoe tours and a local fun ski event, "downhill dummy" with effigies strapped to skis and sent flying downhill. It's all fun and games until a local non-lamented mountain guide get squished by one of the flying dummies. Who killed Fitz Baskin? Jules and co. are soon unearthing clues and motives alongside baking and pastry making.

The plotting, characterization, and dialogue are representative of the genre; lighthearted, somewhat over-the-top, and used to move the narrative along. It's not a realistic procedural. There's no gritty unpleasantness, no brutality (even the violence is mostly off-scene), no blatant sexual aspects, and the language is squeaky clean and used appropriately. Although this is the 18th book in the series, it works fine as a standalone.

For fans of the genre, it's a well written and very pleasant diversion. For readers who enjoy this Bakeshop series, I can heartily recommend the author's Sloan Krause brewing mysteries. She has either a truly impressive grasp of baking, brewing, and coffee culture or she's got experts on tap to consult for her background research. Lots of "foodie" fun to be found in both series. With so many books, it's a great candidate for a binge / buddy read, or possibly for a mystery book club long-term project.

Four stars.

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.