Prepared for Murder: A Culinary Mystery with Recipes

This and the two other books in the short (unfortunately) set of mysteries are some of my favorites. The main character, Charley, is a French chef who owns a restaurant in upstate New York (great fun trying to decipher the actual names of towns, etc. that the author has disguised). He stumbles upon a body in each book, and always feels he needs to solve the murder, even though the local sheriff doesn't appreciate his help. Charley is such a funny, gentle character, and the food references and recipes (I've tried several, yum!) are so delish that the books are pure pleasure to read. True "cozy" mysteries.

Charly Poisson is the chef and owner of LeFermette, an excellent French restaurant in upstate NY. His former partner Maurice is trying to get him to use premade entrees from a new company he has invested in, Fabulous Foods. The owners of that company are a pair of shady businessment Charly has met before. While walking his dog, he finds the body of a local conman. He finds that many of his good friends are suspects. Is the murder connected to the owners of Fabulous Foods? Charly wants to find out.This was a pretty entertaining mystery. The characters were realistic and eccentric at the same time. Charly relies a little too much on Dr. Bach's Flowers, but other than that I really enjoyed the book.