Dead Pan [Paperback]

Gayle Trent (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1, 2009

A "delightful new series." -- Kaye's Penguin Posts Cake decorator Daphne Martin once again finds herself and her cakes at the center of a murder mystery. Half the town gets sick following a cake event, but for poor Fred Duncan, a bout with potential food poisoning quickly turns fatal. Now it's up to Daphne to sort through the likely suspects and figure out who frosted Fred.

Product Details

• Paperback: 208 pages
• Publisher: Bell Bridge Books (November 1, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0984125841
• ISBN-13: 978-0984125845
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 8.5 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #286,415 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Gayle lives in Southwest Virginia with her husband and two gorgeous children. In addition to the Daphne Martin cake decorating series, Gayle writes the Marcy Singer embroidery series under the pseudonym Amanda Lee. Please visit her online at http://www.gayletrent.com.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Book 2 in the Daphne Martin Series, January 7, 2010

By 

Janet Boyer "Author, Blogger, Radio Host" (Pennsylvania) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Dead Pan (Paperback)

"Looking at the photographs fromt he Oklahoma Sugar Art Show started me thinking. I needed to work on my fondant figures in addition to my painting. I decided to start with the figure molding. My nerves needed the distraction." -- From Dead Pan

The breezy second installment of the Daphne Martin cake decorating mystery series, Dead Pan cooks up a delightful culinary cozy mystery that is arguably even better than the first scrumptious book, Murder Takes the Cake.

Dead Pan features some of the quirky, memorable charcters from the first book (e.g. Myra, China York, Belinda Fremont and her award-winning guinea pigs, etc.) and introduces some new ones.

In this installment, brain-damaged Fred Duncan gets violently ill at the Brea Ridge Pharmaceuticals Christmas party along with dozens of others; a doctor in attendance just happened to have a vaccine on hand that counteracts the Campylobacter bacteria--curing everyone except for poor Fred, who ends up dead.

Was the breakout mere coincidence? Or did someone have murder on their mind?

Nosy but likable cake-decorator Daphne Martin finds herself once again in the middle of a police investigation, much to the dismay of her sister, Violet.

I ate up Dead Pan and loved every bite. I can't remember being this entertained and delighted with a cozy series--the first installments of the Coffeehouse Mysteries, maybe?

It was interesting how the author incorporated dialogue between Daphne and real-life Food Network judge and sugar artist, Kerry Vincent. I knew who Vincent was, so her "cameo" was a pleasant surprise (although I'm not sure how Ms. Vincent would feel about being fictionally inserted into a mystery!).

I can tell you this: I'm very much looking forward to reading book 3 in the Daphne Martin Cake Decorating series, Killer Sweet Tooth, which is supposed to come out sometime in 2010. Author Gayle Trent has a knack for creating fun characters, believable dialogue and gentle mysteries, and I'm thrilled I discovered her and the Daphne Martin culinary cozy mystery series!

-- Janet Boyer, author of Back in Time Tarot

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Cute mystery, December 16, 2009

By 

C. Thilmany "Books and Chat" - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Dead Pan (Paperback)

The second book in the Daphne Martin Cake Decorating Mysteries puts Daphne into the uncomfortable situation of investigating the death of an acquaintance. She'd been at the hospital visiting when Fred passed away and his mother begs Daphne for help since she has experience at this type of thing. Of course her own family would prefer that she stayed out of it. More than this initial mystery is solved in this story.

A large part of the story is built around Daphne's business of making and decorating both cake and candy. At first the step by step process for making a gum-paste character seemed a little much, but I began to appreciate some of the ideas and instructions provided in the story as other things were made.

The mystery itself was well done. Information is gathered in a fairly relaxed manner as Daphne goes about doing other things while taking time to ask questions. We're given a number of possibilities but the protagonist isn't easy to guess before the author decides it's time.

I found it a light, enjoyable read.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Don't Waste your Time or Money!, February 20, 2010

By 

Patricia G. Cottrell "VoraciousReader" (Mira Loma, CA) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Dead Pan (Kindle Edition)

I never thought I'd write a bad review, but this book didn't have much of anything going for it except the recipes included. There was a storyline, but it never really developed. All of a sudden, case solved! Huh? There was no sleuthing, no wondering "who done it?" There was really a whole lot of nothing.

Ms. Trent's first book, or at least the first I read, Dead Pan, was a delight and I was looking forward to this one. So much so that I had it on pre-order, at full price (big mistake), and was so incredibly disappointed, that I can honestly say, if you get it free, by all means read it, but don't spend more than $0.99 cents for it. I spent the requisite $9.99 and could kick myself for that now, but as I said, the first one was really good, so one would assume subsequent reads would be as well written, with a storyline and actual sleuthing and case solving, that you're willing to pay the price. Not so with this one; it seems that nothing really happaned, and as I said, all of a sudden, poof, it's over and the culprit is caught and the main character didn't have anything really to do with it.

There was no "case building" or character building, so it left you with not really "knowing" the characters, their personalities, their problems, etc. Don't waste your time; big disappointment; not worth the money; drags; not well written. Sorry, Ms. Trent - thank you for reading my review. I would have rated this 1-1/2 stars, but I don't know how to do half stars :-)