Book Review: The English Breakfast Murder

Reviewed By: Harriet Klausner

The English Breakfast Murder     Amazon US PB Amazon Canada PB
Laura Childs
Class/Genre:   Mystery   Amateur Sleuth   Cozy   Woman Main Character
Series: Theodosia # 4
Berkley, August 2003, $6.99, 288 pp.

The Indigo Tea Shop in Charleston, South Carolina is doing a booming business despite the depressed economy. In addition to selling all kinds of teas from different countries, the owner serves food and sells aromatherapy teas for the bath. The store proprietor, Theodosia Browning realizes there is more to life than work and volunteers her time to the Charleston’s Sea Turtle League. When the eggs hatch, the volunteers make sure they make it safely into the ocean.

When it is Theodosia’s shift she spots a large object floating in the water and swims out to see what it is. She doesn’t expect to find the dead body of local antique dealer Harper Fisk, a good friend of Theodosia’s tea blender Drayton Connelly. Both Clayton and Theodosia are sure the man was murdered even if the police won’t admit it was a homicide. Theodosia, who has solved previous homicides, vows to find the killer even though she is embarking on a dangerous manhunt.

Readers will be charmed and beguiled by this delicious amateur sleuth mystery and will feel like visiting Charles Street to have a cup at the Indigo Tea Shop. Laura Childs makes tea so delectable sounding that a coffee lover will commit heresy and convert. The heroine is a charming down to earth person who believes in helping out her friends and the community, two sides of her personality which will endear her to the audiences. There is a plethora of suspects but the reader will be shocked when the author cleverly reveals who the perpetrator is.

Harriet Klausner

Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Harriet Klausner