It’s a recipe for disaster when bookbinder Brooklyn Wainwright is asked to restore an antique cookbook….

Brooklyn has always been a little obsessed with food, but it was her sister Savannah who became a chef, graduating from the prestigious Cordon Bleu culinary school in Paris. She and her classmates all went on to successful careers, but none of them achieved culinary superstardom, like Savannah’s ex-boyfriend Baxter Cromwell.

When Baxter invites the old gang to participate in his new restaurant’s gala opening in San Francisco, Savannah looks forward to seeing her friends, and even asks Brooklyn to restore a tattered cookbook—an old gift from Baxter—as a present for him. But Brooklyn immediately recognizes that the book, which has strange notes and symbols scrawled in the margins, is at least two hundred years old. She thinks that it probably belongs in a museum, but Savannah insists on returning it to Baxter.

Shortly after receiving the gift, Baxter is found dead, with Savannah kneeling over him, bloody knife in hand, and the rare cookbook has disappeared. Brooklyn knows her sister didn’t kill him, and she suspects the missing cookbook might lead to the real villain. Now Brooklyn will have to turn up the heat on the investigation before Chef Savannah finds herself slinging hash in a prison cafeteria. Bibliophile #7 ( )

I was hungry a lot listening to this book, it seems that if the author is good at what she describes I want to eat it. I guess I'm like a Hobbit wanting my second breakfast and all. Savannah was a great main suspect in the murder, you knew right off that Brooklyn would have to find the murderer and save her vegetarian sister.
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Brooklyn Wainwright, book archivist/restorer, is excited because her sister Savannah, a Cordon Bleu chef, has asked her to restore an old cookbook. Savannah means to give it to another chef, Baxter, who is opening a new restaurant in the city. On opening night, after a delicious gourmet meal cooked by Baxter's other Cordon Bleu alums, Brooklyn and her fiancé, Derek, return to the restaurant after a walk to give Savannah a ride home but instead they find Savannah over Baxter body holding a bloody knife and the cookbook missing . Determined to prove that Savannah was not the killer, Brooklyn and Derek start their own investigation (Derek used to work for British intelligence - handy huh?).

Brooklyn, having had made a copy of the cookbook pages, becomes enthralled by the 200 + year history revealed in the cookbook/journal. Derek notices a code on the pages, notifying his brother that works as a Cryptographer for MI6 who races to town to help break the code.

The secondary mystery of the code along with the search for Baxter's killer has the reader bombarded with clues but what do they pertain to? The murder or te reason for the code?

Wonderfully entertaining with more character development as well as new characters I hope to see in future installments. ( )

Ah, fluffy fun. This is part of series of Bibliophile mysteries and this is the only one I've read so far. I couldn't resist a mystery about a cookbook! It was unbelievable but a fast, easy read that was totally stress free. I actually think I'll read another in this series. Sure, I like to read The Great American Novel every now and then and I like a book that kills off all the characters (every now and then) but sometimes you have to have a book that you know will have a happy ending without too much romance. (I'd rather people get killed off than get swept off their feet.) So, although this had a tad too much sappiness and happily-ever-afterness, I give it a 3 star.

Seriously, though, the lack of knowledge the main character has about certain bookish things is a bit amazing. I think she would be smarter. But then that makes me feel good, doesn't it? Maybe it's the author's ploy to give me that "I know more than you" superior feeling as I read.

You also know it's a bit chick lit when there are sentences such as "I am so not going in there". Ah, well, it must have worked. I am so going to read the first book in the series. ( )

A nice cosy mystery series involving book restorer Brooklyn Wainright, her boyfriend Derek and a dead body. In this case, they are investigating the murder of Baxter Cromwell. Brooklyn's sister Savannah went to cooking school with him and to celebrate the opening of his new restaurant. Baxter does not survive the party and it looks bad when a book that Brooklyn had restored for Savannah to give to him as a gift, disappears as well. I liked seeing Brooklyn relating to her siblings, the frustration she feels because of Savannah's casual mistreatment of books, Savannah's constant swipes at Brooklyn's inability to cook felt real. The fact that we finally got to meet a member of Derek's family was nice as well. The mystery itself is one of her better ones, although her mother needs to be dished out in small doses. ( )