Lavender Blue Murder
Tea maven Theodosia Browning and her tea sommelier Drayton Conneley are guests at a bird hunt styled in the precise manner of an English shooting party. Which means elevenses (sloe gin fizzes), gun loaders, the drawing of pegs, fine-looking bird dogs, and shooting costumes of tweed, herringbone, and suede.
But as gunshots explode like a riff of Black Cat firecrackers, another shot sounds too close for comfort to Theodosia and Drayton. Intrigued but worried, Theodosia wanders into the neighbor’s lavender field where she discovers their host, Reginald Doyle, bleeding to death.
His wife, Meredith, is beside herself with grief and begs Theodosia and Drayton to stay the night. But Theodosia awakens at 2:00 A.M. to find smoke in her room and the house on fire. As the fire department screams in and the investigating sheriff returns, Meredith again pleads with Theodosia for help.
As Theodosia investigates, fingers are pointed, secrets are uncovered, Reginald’s daughter-in-law goes missing, presumed drowned, and Meredith is determined to find answers via a séance. All the while, Theodosia worries if she’s made a mistake in inviting a prime suspect to her upscale Lavender Lady Tea.
Series: A Tea Shop Mystery – Book #21
Author: Laura Childs
Genre: Cozy Mystery/Tea Shop
Publisher: Berkley Publishing Group
Page Count: 336
Rating: 
From Berkley Publishing, the 21st book Lavender Blue Murder in the tasty tea cozy series, “A Tea Shop Mystery” from author Laura Childs.
“A Tea Shop Mystery” tea cozy series and the latest addition in this series is a fantastic read by a talented and ingenious writer who knows how to describe her subject and makes tea into a mystery everyone will want to solve.
Theo and Drayton are captivating characters that readers will want to spend endless hours with. Other characters play a smaller role but are equally impressive. And Earl Gray is just adorable. The setting of Charleston is romantic, historical and gives readers a sense of stepping back in time into the high society days of the Victorian and Gilded Age. This book could have used a bit more of Theo’s boyfriend and could have benefitted from a more in-depth background on Theo and other characters for those who have not read the series from the beginning.
The suspects in this tea cozy book are intriguing, the motives understandable and straightforward, but curious enough that readers have to pay attention to the evidence. When the murderer and the kidnapper are finally revealed, it becomes apparent who did it and why. I figured out who the killer was almost from the beginning but had enough doubt to keep reading to the end to verify my guess. Unfortunately, I did not buy the car chase scene and felt that Theo’s carelessness with Drayton and an injured Fawn’s well-being was foolish and dangerous. The solution to the kidnapping was too obvious.
Some say that tea is a way of life; in my case, it is in my DNA. Tea is enjoyed around the world by people from all walks of life. Lavender Blue Murder is sumptuous, compelling, and built around a good old-fashioned mystery. Readers should sit back with a hot cup of their favorite blend and enjoy a couple of peaceful hours. In the end, this tea cozy is worth the read. The recipes at the end are so good you can almost taste them.
Readers who enjoy tea cozy series may also like Bree Baker’s entertaining “Seaside Café Mysteries” or Julia Buckley’s delightful series “A Hungarian Tea House Mystery.”
About the Author:
Laura Childs is a pseudonym for Gerry Schmitt, former owner/CEO/Creative Director of a marketing/advertising firm in Minneapolis. Laura Childs is the bestselling author of the Tea Shop Mystery series and the Scrapbook Mystery series. She is a consummate tea drinker, scrapbooker, and dog lover and frequently travels to China and Japan with Dr. Bob, her professor husband. She loves to travel, rides horses, enjoys fundraising for various non-profits, and has two Chinese Shar-Pei dogs. Laura specializes in cozy mysteries that have the pace of a thriller (a thrillzy!)
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