by Sandra Murphy

Details at the end of this post on how to enter to win a copy of Mother’s Day Muffins and Murder. We also have a link to order it from Amazon, and from an indie bookstore where a portion goes to help support KRL.

Ellie Avery’s schedule is always busy. Her husband is deployed on a mission, due back in a couple of weeks. Her kids are at an age that there are tons of extra activities. She’s got to be organized. In fact, she’s made a part time job of it.

She has a friend who does the same work but without the added distractions. Gabrielle is always well dressed, tends to talk over any objections and manages to drop her successes into the conversation mixed with Ellie’s lack of the same. It seems only fair that Gabrielle find a dead body in the janitor’s closet at the school. Before she and Ellie can report it to the principal, the fire alarm sounds, and the school is evacuated. When they return with the principal, there’s no body.

It’s the end of the school year. Ellie’s got to make sure volunteer parents bring food for Teacher Appreciation Week, work the booth during Field Day, have muffins with each of her kids in their classroom, plus keep up with her own paid work. Gabriella knows Ellie has had some experience with solving mysteries before and dumps the whole thing in her lap, saying no one will think she’s a reliable business person if it can’t be proved there was a body.

The body is re-discovered in the woods behind the school. Since it’s one of the school’s employees, it narrows the suspect field by quite a bit. Ellie’s afraid to think one of the people who works there is a killer.

Detective Waraday has dealt with Ellie before although this time he seems much calmer about her involvement and even asks for her help. He’s smart enough to realize that as a volunteer who is spending so much time at the school for end of the year activities, she’s bound to hear and learn more than he can during interviews. Soon rumors of blackmail surface although no one has definite information or so they say. The office is vandalized, a water pipe breaks in a file storage room, and a teacher is found to have lied on her application. It seems one thing after another is happening but how many have to do with the murder?

This is book ten in the Mom Zone Mystery series. Ellie is a great character although more organized than most! There are Room Mother Tips included which can be appreciated by any mom who has found a wrinkled paper dated a week ago saying she was volunteered by her kid to make three dozen cupcakes—for tomorrow.

This is a fast, enjoyable read with a good number of suspects to choose from. I did figure out who did it but not until near the end. Spend some time with Ellie—she’ll help you get organized, at home or school.

To enter to win a copy of Mother’s Day Muffins and Murder, simply email KRL at krlcontests@gmail[dot]com by replacing the [dot] with a period, and with the subject line “mothers,” or comment on this article. A winner will be chosen May 20, 2017. U.S. residents only. If entering via email please include your mailing address, and if via comment please include your email address.

Check out other mystery articles, reviews, book giveaways & short stories in our mystery section.

Use this link to purchase the book & a portion goes to help support KRL & indie bookstore Mysterious Galaxy:

Mother’s Day, Muffins, and Murder

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Sandra Murphy lives in the shadow of the Arch, in the land of blues, booze and shoes—St Louis, Missouri. While writing magazine articles to support her mystery book habit, she secretly polishes mystery books of her own, hoping, someday, they will see the light of Barnes and Noble and a Kindle. You can find several of Sandra’s short stories at Untreed Reads including her newest, “Arthur,” included in the anthology titled, Flash and Bang, available now. Look for Denali, in the anthology Dogs and Dragons.

Disclosure: This post contains links to an affiliate program, for which we receive a few cents if you make purchases using those links. KRL also receives free copies of most of the books that it reviews, that are provided in exchange for an honest review of the book.