Bell, Cook, and Candle: An Angie Amalfi Mystery

by Joanne Pence

A Dash of Darkness For once Angie Amalfi's newest culinary venture, "Comical Cakes," seems to be a roaring success There's nothing funny, however, about her homicide detective boyfriend Paavo Smith's... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Mass Market Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0061030848
• ISBN13: 9780061030840
• Release Date: January 2002
• Publisher: Avon Books
• Length: 336 Pages
• Weight: 0.40 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 4.2" x 6.8"

Customer Reviews

Ebony Candles Flicker In Eerie Night Breezes

The first several pages were riveting. They read like a true mystery with gutsy horror-implants. Then Angie staged in with her shining silver Mercedes, spitting through an argument with her friend, Connie, all the while dripping blood-spiced words here and there which subliminaled the reader with flashes to the rat crunching, blood-spewing, opening scene. Oh my! Definitely workable as entertaining fiction, BELL, COOK and CANDLE, a paranormal/culinary with astrology in its plot, delves into the demonic, ugly side of witchcraft. As the back flap on BC & C says, its plot has a "Dash of Darkness." While the whole book was great, the second half was an absolute, relentless capture, with the plot machinations rolling well and the characters growing deeper. How did Pence do this so adeptly, within the boundaries of a paranormal culinary? Possibly I should mention, though, that if a reader is craving a cozy with drool-inducing food references, and recipes woven sensually, mouth watering-ly into the plot, this title does not do a depth charge there. The main character, Angie Amalfi, is testing an ingenious new business called COMICAL CAKES, and three recipes are included at the end of the story, but the cooking/eating process does not overwhelm 95% of the plot (to "fix" those obsessive/compulsive, nuance-lush, needy, needy taste buds). However, the richness of the intrigue developed from the paranormal undercurrents in this work gives more than enough sensual intrigue to provide a very successful, entertaining read, with the characters developed with a myriad of machinations to moisturize the cerebral dryness which some readers can't seem to get into in certain types of classic mystery fiction. The escalating plot and character development in the final quarter of the book kept me flipping pages through those times when I would have normally temporarily retired my ongoing paperback and slipped into a bout of wordless day dreaming, or picked up the RC for the TV. This was actually the first novel I had read in in the Amalfi series, and I had read it years ago (August 2002). At the time, I was contrasting a collection of culinary, recipes-included authors, seeking for more, more, more FLAVOR, and disappointed if the in-plot cooking was minimal. Yet, as I dove into that collection, I found gems like this one, which surprised me by providing other types of reading satisfaction which worked as well or better than what I though I was craving. Still, at that time I was a definite gourmet junkie without the ambition to do any great guns cooking in my own kitchen. At that time of culinary desperation, I noted: "I will definitely be tempted to read another Joanne Pence mystery with Angie Amalfi; I'll be curious to see if her other offerings include more cooking details within the plot. Are Diane Mott Davidson (with her Goldy-the-Caterer series) and Phyllis Richman (WHO'S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA HAM) the only culinary authors who actually COOK, with any

Angie and Paavo keep getting better and better!

After the last book in this series, I was ready for Angie and Paavo to start talking marriage. Well, so was Paavo! But Joanne Pence skillfully keeps us in suspense about that as well as about the identity of the ritualistic killer who seems to be targeting Angie for his ultimate victim until the exciting climax. I look forward to the next mystery in this series because with Joanne's talent, she's bound to keep readers in suspense about pulling off a wedding while scaring the daylights out of us with a clever mystery. She has another winner on her hands!

humorous novel that has cross-genre appeal

After numerous false starts, plenty of failures, and several times quitting out of boredom, Angle Arnolf has finally found a business that she performs well and that people appreciate. "Commercial Cakes" is doing so well that Angie barely has time to sleep. This frustrates her boyfriend homicide detective Paavo Smith, who after much deliberating, has finally worked up the courage to ask her to marry him. Every time Paavo begins to propose, Angie is distracted, called to the phone or falls asleep. She ends up hiring two employees who are into the Goth scene while Paavo happens to work on a serial killer case involving Goths. He doesn't know how, but based on experience with his beloved, Paavo expects Angie is going to become involved in his case though he hates it when she places her life in danger. Joanne Pence writes an ingenious mystery that is both hilarious and deadly serious, sometimes at the same time. The proposal scenes are hysterical while the action scenes involving the Goth cult are frightening even as they seem otherworldly. BELL, COOK AND CANDLE is a humorous novel that has cross-genre appeal.Harriet Klausner