Playing with Bonbon Fire

Charity Penn is finally settling into life in the quirky South Carolina seaside town of Camellia Beach and cooking up chocolate treats, sometimes. She has helped organize the town’s lively beach music festival, which has brought rollicking crowds. That is until one of the band’s lead singer is found dead beside a beach bonfire.

While also trying to balance the amorous attention of music star Bixby Lewis, in town for the festival, and her quest to perfect a new hot flavored bonbon, Charity dives into the investigation. Though it’s more spice than sugar when she discovers a threatening note and comes across decades of age-old secrets. Bixby comes into the line of fire when a gas grill explodes on the deck of a beachfront house, and a crazy stalker is chasing after him.

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Series: A Southern Chocolate Shop Mystery – Book #2
Author: Dorothy St. James
Genre: Cozy Mystery/Culinary
Publisher: Crooked Lane Books

Rating:

Charity (Penn) is an evolving character who is slowly opening up and enjoying the love and attention of those around her. This is a lively and exciting story filled with all the elements of a good who-done-it. Playing with Bonbon Fire is the second book in the “A Southern Chocolate Shop Mystery” series and is a wonderful adventure into the past and the present.

Penn is not used to having anyone care about her. When her new friends who have shown her nothing but kindness and love find themselves under suspicion, she does whatever it takes to help the police find a killer bent on framing one of them, but not everything can be solved with chocolate.

Penn is a likable character who is becoming more and more loveable. In the first book of this series, Asking for Truffle, Penn was always downcast with no hope for the future. In this latest installment, she has become more outgoing, more trusting, and fiercely protective of her friends even though her heart is breaking over the past. She has found her niche creating chocolate treats, and becoming a part of the community.

Tina, Penn’s sister, plays a much bigger role in this book, and readers will love her. She is everything Penn is not but is the one-person Penn has always loved and knew that she was loved in return. Other returning characters such as Harley are also present and play important roles in the discovery of the killer, and helping Penn discover new and exciting flavors for her chocolate business and her life.

The ocean side setting is a lovely picture of everything a seaside town should be minus the murder. Camellia Beach is a caring community that doesn’t hesitate to lend a helping hand when Penn needs it the most. It has become home, and she will protect it for as long as she can.

Playing with Bonbon Fire is a great addition to the series, and readers will be left wanting more. Ms. St. James is a talented writer who knows how to grow characters into loveable members of a reader’s fictitious family. This book and series are highly recommended to lovers of chocolate and intrigue.