Waiting on WEDNESDAY: May New Releases (part 1)

  New releases for May! A few cozy mysteries I am looking forward to reading this month.

FRIDAY: Cut, Crop and Die

Scrapbooker, Kiki Lowenstein is getting ready to kick off a great crop with her boss and coworkers from Time in a Bottle when the nasty Yvonne Graynor snarfs down her snacks and drops dead. The scrapbooking store competition is stirring up the community with slanderous statements. Kiki's boss is getting anti-semetic threats at the shop. If Kiki isn't careful, she's going to lose her precious and fulfilling job. And she needs if if she's going to take care of her daughter (a "delightful" almost-teenager who's pushing all of Kiki's buttons) and rebuild her life.

Another great mystery in this series! Slan has her own website where you can sign up for email news and see where Slan will be on book tours. She also has a blog, as does her scrapbooking character, Kiki.

Warning - there is a hilarious passage about "adult toys" that might catch sensitive readers off guard.

FRIDAY: Paper, Scissors, Death

Kiki Lowenstein - wife, mother and scrapbooker - finds her life turned upside down when her husband is found dead - and naked - in a local hotel. Not only does she lose her spouse, but her comfortable life of wealth. Then she finds herself fighting her MIL for custody of her daughter and is suspected of murder. She has to piece the puzzle together just like her scrapbook layouts to solve the mystery.

This was a delightful book; I had a hard time putting it down. I have tried another scrapbooking series and I had to really work at them. I wanted to like them because they were about my hobby, but I finally had to give up. This new series by Joanna Campbell Slan is so easy to love. I enjoyed the characters, the evolution of Kiki, and felt inspired to scrapbook for the first time in almost a year. I can think of no higher praise than that!

(This review was previously posted on my Pizza Monkey blog which no longer exists)