6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
COOKING FOR IDIOTS COOKS UP MURDER!, May 24, 2002
This is my first visit to the world of Catering Capers with Faith Fairchild and I found it very enjoyable. The book opens in the middle of January when no one is in the mood for social affairs, which in turn makes Faith's catering business less than bustling. So she agrees to go undercover (in the guise of teaching a Cooking For Idiots class) at a boys' prep school to investigate some racist attacks against the school's sole African-American student.
Unfortunately, the only thing her class cooks up is theft and multiple murders - one being that of her prime suspect in the racist attack who turns up well done in a school rally bonfire. But we know all the incidents have to be connected someway. And Faith will figure it all out in the end with some surprising results.
Faith is a very likable heroine - her adventures make for fun reading and her recipes at the end of the book are quite tasty. The Smothered Pork Chops were first rate, but her Peanut Butter Cookies couldn't compare to the ones my mother used to make.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Not great, but not bad either, March 19, 2002
By A Customer
This latest installment in this series has a lot going for it. It is centered in a New England boarding school peopled with interesting characters, many of whom the author does a better than usual job of portraying. Our intrepid heroine gets lots of opportunities to be intrepid, including engaging in some conduct that is moderately indefensible (such as wholesale room searches). The plot is a bit on the unconvincing side, given that it depends on the confluence of two (and, depending on how you count, maybe three) entirely independent sets of events.
The editing job on this book is also better than usual, with the exception of a couple of name mistakes. (Thomas Moser cherry furniture is fabulous, but the book unhappily corrupts the name to Thomas Mosher, an entity of whom I have never heard.)
The primary down side to this book is that I bought it in hardback and read it in a couple of hours. I would be happier about spending the money for the hardback if the book had supplied a longer period of absorption.
As I said, not a great book, but a pleasant one.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
A 3.4 on a scale of 1 to 5, Good not Great, August 7, 2003
This review is from: The Body in the Bonfire (Faith Fairchild Mysteries) (Mass Market Paperback)
"The Body in the Bonfire" once again features the indomitable sleuth, Faith Fairchild, minister's wife and suburban Boston caterer by day, Nancy Drew by night.
In this installment, Faith teaches a cooking class at a second or third tier boarding school in her New England town. She has a secret assignment, which is to find out who is sending racial slur messages to the one black student. The school is filled with a cast of colorful characters: a way too preppy good boy/bad boy student, the Russian wife of the headmaster, an intense guru like professor and so on. The plot thickens when someone shows up dead in the school's annual bonfire.
I always enjoy these books. However, I have found-particularly in this one-Hall throws out a lot of cliches. She does not offer much depth in her characters or in her story. For example, most private schools in New England today (even second and third tier ones) have more than one black student (many whose parents pay) as well as a number of Asian, Hispanic and other ethnic and religious minorities. Her depiction of Aleford,the boarding school, does not ring true in the early 00's. In addition, she loves to poke fun at the down-to-earth, Yankee frugality and sensibilities of her neighbors. Yes, her observations were true about 25 years ago. However, most New England towns are filled with a more diverse and sophisticated population in the early 00's than in her books. Finally, while she seems ever so concerned about political correctness throughout the novel vis a vis ethnic and religious minorities, she is beyond condescending to the blue collar female police officer. At the end of the book, Faith offers to help her with her makeup. Please, talk about noblesse oblige.
Still, this book is an enjoyable read. Plus, you get some very good recipes at the end.
I'd recommend this book to those who enjoy cozy mysteries and previous Page books. I wouldn't recommend this book to those who require too much depth in their mysteries (a la Elizabeth George) or books.
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