13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A good cullinary mystery, November 29, 1999
In Kansas City, Heaven Lee is considered one of the top chefs. Her restaurant Heaven's Cafe is very popular. However, her personal life is on hold as her boyfriend is out of town attending two months of intensive training on new medical procedures. Heaven poccupies herself with the gala opening of a restoration project at Eighteenth and Vine. The district will host eateries, jazz clubs, and the Negro Leagues baseball museum.
Events planner Evelyn Edwards coordinates the various festivities connected with the opening. Mona Kirk, a local mover and shaker Mona Kirk confronts Evelyn after learning she has demanded kickbacks from the vendors. At a committee meeting, the lights go out. When they come back on, Evelyn's electrocuted body lies near the circuit board in what is obviously murder. Heaven begins her own inquiries, as everyone is a suspect.
THE CORNBREAD KILLER should carry a warning label for dieters: "Not to be read on an empty stomach" because each chapter opens up with a delicious food recipe that is easy to prepare. The characters make the novel a success. They seem so real they appear to be borrowed from Lou Jane Temple's life. The amateur sleuth story line is entertaining. Fans of culinary mysteries will want to devour this excellent meal.
Harriet Klausner
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good Solid Read, April 30, 2000
By A Customer
I enjoyed this book by Ms. Temple a great deal. It centers around a revitilzation festival where and event's planner has suffered a mysterious accident. There are an array of suspects from an alleged farther to a bitter sister.
It is up to Heven Lee, the food coordinato for the event, to handle the task. I stumbled on this author at my local library. I am a big fan of culinary mysteries and was pleasantly suprised to find this solid read. If you like Diane Mott Davidson you will enjoy this author.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Better Than The Last, February 16, 2004
By A Customer
This review is from: The Cornbread Killer (Heaven Lee Culinary Mysteries) (Paperback)
The Cornbread Killer is better than the other books in this series, except for "A Stiff Risotto", which I really enjoyed.
The Eighteenth and Vine Street Historical District is opening with a big Jazz Festival and the new Negro Leagues Baseball Museum.
Heaven Lee and her friend Mona are on the committee and things are starting out bad when the Festival Planner gets electrocuted on stage while checking out the lighting.
Who would want to kill her? Was it because she was taking kickbacks? And why would someone who had just arrived in town be given the job of Festival Planner? Did the theft of priceless paintings and Charlie's Parkers sax have any connection?
Heaven and her band of employee's and friends set out to solve the mystery and make sure that the Festival goes off without any more problems.
Although I gave this book only 2 stars, it is much better than the other books in the series, although not as good as A Stiff Risotto which I gave 3 stars.
I had disliked Heaven in the first books in this series, but she has improved over each book and I now like her more. This book, however, finally solved a problem for me that I'd been having with the series. In most books you feel an attachment to the heroine and the continuing characters. I have never felt this in this series.
In this book Heaven makes a casual remark about if high heels were ok with her attire, which were her usual tights & a T-shirt. I tried to imagine a 45ish woman who ran around in tights & a T-shirt and realized, I don't have a clue as to what Heaven looks like.
She has short, spiky red hair and that's it. I realized that there are no descriptions of these people. Not only, don't I have any kind of image of Heaven but it's the same for all the reoccurring people. As I thought of the characters, I realized that the only one who brings up an image to me, is her 25ish boyfriend, Hank.
I think that may be why the stories are hard to follow at times. There are always a lot of new characters each book and they're just names, nothing to distinguish them from each other. I think that's part of reason I found it so hard to get a feel for Heaven and her friends.
Even with these problems, this book was good. I liked the information about the Jazz Festival and the Negro League Baseball Museum.
Heaven, once again shows that she has great chemistry with other men, while having none with her boyfriend. I wish Chris and Joe were more involved in the storyline and I still miss Bo Morales.
For the first time, there were recipes that I would like to try in this book.
I had received the first 6 books as a Christmas Gift. This book made me decide, that although I have problems with the stories, I have begun to enjoy Heaven and her friends and the mysteries, so I purchased Death Is Semisweet. I decided this series is good enough that I wanted to finish it out before starting a new series.
For people who have not read any of her books, these are not Cozy Mysteries. There is a lot of profanity and sexual innuendo's.
It's on to Red Beans and Vice.
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