Book Review: The Chocolate Bunny Brouhaha by JoAnna Carl (Chocoholic Mysteries #16)

Stars: 5 out of 5

Pros: Fun characters; delightful mystery

Cons: A minor timeline issue

The Bottom Line:

Locked construction zone

Adds fun touch to mystery

Books always delight

What Mess Has Bunny Brought to TenHuis Chocolade?

As I sat down to read The Chocolate Bunny Brouhaha, I began to wonder why this was the first time in the long running Chocoholic Mysteries series that we were visiting Lee Woodyard and TenHuis Chocolade in their gear up for Easter.  I mean, that is a huge holiday for chocolate makers, especially the makers of gourmet chocolate.  Granted, it’s rare that the theme plays a huge part in the story, but as this book opens, it is later winter, and the shop has transitioned from Valentine’s Day hearts to Easter bunnies.

Lee and her aunt Nettie, who actually owns the shop, have recently hired a new employee, Bunny Birdsong, a woman going through a divorce.  Unfortunately, Bunny isn’t quite working out in the chocolate making portion of the business, and Lee is about to fire her when she suddenly sees Bunny might be the help she needs on the office side of things.

Bunny comes with a lot of baggage in the form of her soon to be ex, his current girlfriend, and his aunt Abigail, who is determined to keep Bunny and Beau together.  After an afternoon of drama in the shop from the extended group, Abigail’s body is found in the building next door, currently under constructions so TenHuis can expand into it.  However, all the doors into the buildings and between the units should have been locked.  Who had access to the keys?  The police think Bunny had a good motive, but Lee doesn’t think the woman has the personality to commit murder.  Can she clear her employee’s name?

The books in this series are always a little shorter than most of the others I read.  This one is no exception at 227 pages.  Yet the author doesn’t waste a minute.  We jump into the story right away and things continue to advance from one complication to another until we reach the climax.  Yes, everything does make sense by the time we reach the end, including the variation on the locked room mystery set up here.

I do often complain that because the books are short, we don’t get to see much of the supporting players, but a couple of them get more page time in this book, which I really appreciated.  The main trio, Lee, her husband Joe, and Aunt Nettie are here as always, and I really enjoy spending time with them.  And the characters introduced for this story are as strong and entertaining as ever.

I did catch an error in the timeline, one of my pet peeves, as characters started talking about something that happened “yesterday” when it was really several days before.  Fortunately, that editing error didn’t impact anything else in the book, and it is clearly just that, an editing error.

Instead of recipes, this series has always included chocolate trivia scattered throughout the book.  This time, we look at several key figures in the development of chocolate as we know it today stretching from Christopher Columbus to Milton Hershey.  This time around, we do get one comfort food recipe for a delicious sounding potato soup mentioned earlier in the book.

I’ve been reading the Chocoholic series since the very beginning, and I truly am hooked on these delicious mysteries.  If you suffer from the same addiction I do, you’ll be delighted with The Chocolate Bunny Brouhaha.

Need to feed your addiction?  Here are the rest of the Chocoholic Mysteries in order.

NOTE: I received a copy of this book.

Giveaway!

Thanks to the publisher, I have one copy of this book to give away.  Because it is a physical book, the contest is limited to residence of the US.

Just leave me a comment with your e-mail address so I can get in touch with you if you win.  I will pick the winner next Tuesday, November 8th, so please leave your comment before 12:01AM Pacific Time on 11/8.  You will have until midnight on 11/13 to get back to me, or I will choose a new winner on 11/14.