by Cleo Coyle
Part of Coffeehouse Mystery
First published 2008
Joy Cosi is nineteen, ambitious, and thrilled to be interning under one of New York City's most demanding chefs. She is also falling hard for him. Then someone turns up dead, and Joy is the one the police start looking at. Clare Cosi runs the Village Blend coffeehouse in Greenwich Village. She has spent years pulling perfect espresso shots and navigating the complicated business of raising a daughter on her own. Now that daughter is facing a murder charge, and Clare cannot wait for the justice system to sort itself out. She starts asking questions. The restaurant world she steps into is competitive and claustrophobic, full of people with reasons to want the victim gone. Every answer Clare finds points toward more danger. The investigation pulls her deeper into a world where ambition and resentment run as hot as a commercial kitchen at full service. This is the sixth book in the Coffeehouse Mystery series. The emotional center is a mother who knows her child is innocent and will put herself at serious risk to prove it. Clare is not fearless. She is just unwilling to stop.
Genres: domestic-fiction, mystery, crime, contemporary, adult-fiction
Vibes: emotional, fast-paced, gritty, protective, suspenseful
Tropes: amateur-investigation, determined-protagonist, found-family, protective-parent
Setting: New York City, Greenwich Village, Village Blend
Period: 21st-century, contemporary
270 pages · Mass Market Paperback · Berkley Books
Content warnings: death, murder