Blueberry Blunder

by Amanda Flower

If you need an escape from real life or from a challenging nonfiction book, I highly recommend Blueberry Blunder. Amanda Flower has once more written a cozy mystery that confounds the reader and includes a lot of humor and a tad of romance.

Bailey, a former New York chocolatier, is currently expanding Swissmen Sweets, an Amish candy shop she owns with her grandmother in Harvest, Ohio. The candy factory under construction experiences a huge setback when Bailey has to fire her general contractor and then later finds him dead in the unfinished factory. His murder is, of course, the prime focus of the mystery, but there are many other threads. Cousin Charlotte who is estranged from her Amish family because she decided not to join the church is preparing for her wedding to Deputy Little. There are lots of interactions of Amish and Englisch in this cozy, and it is a great opportunity to see that there are many differences among the various Amish districts. Aiden, Bailey’s boyfriend, resigns from Ohio’s Bureau of Investigation, and returns to Harvest to begin a business as a Private Investigator. His mother Juliet is thrilled and is anxious for him to propose to Bailey. Meanwhile, Juliet is convinced that Jethro, her polka-dotted pot bellied pig needs to frequently accompany Bailey as she goes through her day making candy and investigating crimes. Bailey is also being shadowed by an intrusive film crew of two from Gourmet Network which produces Bailey’s candy show.

There is plenty of fun to go around and lots of characters with probable motivation for murder. I very much enjoyed my return visit to Swissmen Sweets and Harvest, Ohio.

I received a complimentary copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

Rating: 5/5

Category: Mystery

Notes: #8 in the Amish Candy Shop Mystery series, but can definitely be read as a standalone because the author does an outstanding job of filling in background without boring readers of previous books in the series.

Publication:  May 23, 2023—Kensington

Memorable Lines:

“Sit.” She pointed at the empty chair at the table. I fell into the chair as if I had been shot from the sky. Graceful to a fault, that was me, I thought sarcastically.

It was a clear to me that he had some of the same anger issues as his father. He might not like how his dad treated him, but I could see him going down the same bitter road himself.

I could think of about a million things that I would rather do than spend the day with the elder Littles, such as swim with sharks and get a root canal.