Welcome to Cozy Wednesday!
I am very excited to share Bree Baker’s A Call for Kelp today!
A Call for Kelp (Seaside Café Mysteries)
Cozy Mystery
4th in Series
Setting – North Carolina
Publisher: Poisoned Pen Press (May 26, 2020)
Mass Market Paperback: 352 pages
ISBN-10: 1728205727
ISBN-13: 978-1728205724
Kindle ASIN: B082LNCZN6
It’s sink or swim for Everly with her most bizarre case yet!
Everly Swan is busy as a bee running her beachside iced tea shop, and the small island of Charm, North Carolina is abuzz-Mitzi Calgon, an iconic Hollywood actress, is in town! Everly’s great-aunts are making a documentary about beekeeping and Mira has agreed to help. But when the actress turns up dead, reporters and fans swarm the island, muddying the water and disrupting the peaceful lives of the townspeople.
Everly’s never been good at minding her own beeswax, so she starts following her own leads and combing through the evidence. Then there’s the mystery of Detective Hays-ever since their kiss under the mistletoe, he’s been acting distant. And he’s annoyingly determined to keep Everly away from the case. But when she receives a cryptic warning to “Bee Careful”, Everly realizes that she’s gotten herself into a really sticky situation…
Dollycas’s Thoughts
Bees, bees, bees, it’s all about the bees as Hollywood icon, Mitzi Calgon, comes to town to lend her voice to a documentary about beekeeping and saving the bees for Clara and Fran Swan. Before the project even gets off the ground there is a buzz in the air and one dead actress. Everly’s focus should be on her ice tea shop but she can’t get her mind off that Mitzi knew her grandmother and that she has to get her justice even when she is given a huge warning to “Bee Careful”.
The Sun, Sand, and Tea in Charm, North Carolina is a place I would love to spend day after day even with all the drama of a murder.
Ms. Baker has penned a multifaceted story. We have the recent murder, Detective Grady Hays is dealing with a family issue that has been building over the course of the series. He has also been pulling away from Everly. The excellent character development continues as all the core characters are still evolving nicely. The characters added for this story brought some intrigue. I just wish Mitzi hadn’t been the victim. She was a woman full of stories.
The mystery was very well-plotted and written. I did enjoy that Everly gets help from someone other than Grady and that there were plenty of suspects, secrets, twists, and a surprising reveal. The pace was perfect and I was totally delighted with this book.
Ideal setting, a captivating mystery, and terrific characters make A Call for Kelp
Your Escape Into A Good Book Travel Agent
You can read my review of No Good Tea Goes Unpunished
Bree Baker is a Midwestern writer, obsessed with small-town high jinks, sweet tea, and the sea. She’s been telling stories to her family, friends, and strangers for as long as she can remember, and more often than not, those stories feature a warm ocean breeze and a recipe she’s sure to ruin. Now, she’s working on those fancy cooking skills and dreaming up adventures for the Seaside Cafe mysteries. Bree is a member of Sisters in Crime, International Thriller Writers and the Romance Writers of America. She is represented by Jill Marsal of Marsal Lyon Literary Agency.
I am giving away my Advanced Review Copy!
The contest is open to anyone over 18 years old
with a US mailing address.
Duplicate entries will be deleted. Void where prohibited.
You do not have to be a follower to enter but I hope you will find
something you like here and become a follower.
Followers Will Receive 2 Bonus Entries For Each Way They Follow.
Plus 2 Bonus Entries For Liking My Facebook Fan Page.
Add this book to your WANT TO READ shelf on GoodReads for 3 Bonus Entries.
Pin this giveaway to Pinterest for 3 Bonus Entries.
If you publicize the giveaway on Twitter or Facebook or anywhere you will receive
5 Bonus Entries For Each Link.
Contest Will End June 3, 2020, at 11:59 PM CST
Winner Will Be Chosen By Random.org
Winner Will Be Notified By Email
and Will Be Posted Here In The Sidebar.
Click Here For Entry Form
Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the publisher. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. Receiving a complimentary copy in no way reflected my review of this book. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”
This is how my 
were born. Eventually, I’d spent one-too-many decades on a rented deck, wondering what it would be like to live in a quaint seaside town, and I decided to write about it. Now, I live vicariously through my main character, Everly Swan, owner, operator and sole proprietor of Sun, Sand and Tea, a seaside iced tea shop and café in her hometown of Charm, North Carolina. (I couldn’t choose a favorite Outer Banks town, so I took all my favorite parts of other area towns and created Charm instead. – That’s a fun perk of writing. Don’t like something? Make up something else instead.)
Now I escape to one version of the islands I love each day while I write about Everly and her fantastic escapades, but, it got me thinking… If I escape to the islands, where do islanders escape? I decided to ask Everly and it turns out she had quite a bit to say on the subject.
As it turns out, Everly is a bit of an escape artist. She often sometimes escapes into nature, walking the boardwalk, digging her toes in the sand or wading through the surf. Other times, especially once she’s in her jammies, she escapes into a book. She frequently borrows novels from the Little Libraries her best friend, Amelia, has set up throughout the town and on the boardwalk. If her great-aunts are home, Everly escapes to the Swan family homestead where they share midnight pancakes and endless glasses of sweet tea around a table that has been in their kitchen for more than a hundred years. But her most common and favorite escape of all is to her café. If not to eat her secret stash of lemon cake, then to create something new and magnificent to share.
Iced strawberry and peach tea. I hope you will enjoy! And if you’re in the mood for an island escape, but can’t make it over to the Outer Banks just yet, feel free to join Everly on an adventure in Charm. She’d sure love to have you, and spending a few days in her life is certain to make you smile.
Summer Strawberry & Peach Tea
was a wonderfully entertaining story. Each book in this series has left me excited for the next. I hope I don’t have to wait too long for my next virtual vacay to Charm! I highly recommend all three of the books that have been released so far!
, I want more!! More Bree, more Aunt Clara, and Aunt Fran, more Detective Hays, and more of the charming life in Charm, North Carolina! I can’t wait for my next trip.
