Even as the weather cools and Halloween approaches, business remains brisk at the Udderly Delicious Ice Cream Shop I manage in picture-perfect Penniman, Connecticut. My crew and I are busy scooping our organic ice cream for leaf peepers and tourists who’ve come for the town’s Halloween Happening Fall Festival and to catch a glimpse of the stars that are filming a movie right here in Penniman.
My dad‘s Penniless Reader Bookshop has been chosen as a set for a brand new Skylark movie, “Bound for Love.” Skylark is similar to Hallmark, famous for making sweet romances in absolutely gorgeous settings. I have to say, Dad‘s bookstore is perfect for a meet-cute, with its low ceiling, overstuffed reading chairs, and a cozy stone fireplace that my stepmother, Paulette, has decorated with dried blue hydrangea and pumpkins for the Halloween season.
Most of the filming is planned for the grand colonial Inn on the Green, and the cast and crew are staying there. Former teen star Cooper Collins is directing, and even twenty years later, he still has his heartthrob good looks. The whole town is starstruck, and lucky Paulette and Sprinkles, my neurotic cat, have been cast as extras.
Adding to the excitement, the Inn’s owner, Cooper’s mother Diantha Collins, has asked me to create an ice cream cake for her Halloween themed sixth wedding. It was quite a challenge to create a layered ice cream cake with her three favorite flavors – pistachio, chai, and pumpkin spice — but we are thrilled with the result.
Though I was pleased to get this job, complications have swirled. Cooper and his brother, Sam, are in the wedding party but haven’t bothered to hide their displeasure at their mother’s May-December romance – and the impending changes to her will. One of Diantha’s former flames has taken desperate steps to stop the wedding. And a break-in at the ice cream shop has me wondering if one of my staff can be trusted.
I sense storm clouds gathering over the Inn as the fractured family arrives, and it’s not just your usual Halloween vibes. Has Diantha Collins tempted fate by planning a Halloween wedding? Something makes me think that these wedding bells don’t signal a happy ending, and that someone’s planning to say “I do” to murder.
Fatal Fudge Swirl, An Ice Cream Shop Mystery Book #3
Genre: Cozy
Release: June 2023
Format: Print, Digital
Purchase Link
A movie production brings drama—and murder—to a close-knit New England village, forcing Riley Rhodes to scoop out the suspects.
Former CIA librarian and amateur sleuth Riley Rhodes is loving her fresh start as the manager of the Udderly Delicious Ice Cream Shop. The leaves are turning, tourists are leaf-peeping, and Penniman, Connecticut is putting finishing touches on the weekend long Halloween Happening. But the village is also buzzing. Former child star Cooper Collins is overseeing the production of a romantic comedy that’s filming on the town green and his domineering socialite mother, Diantha, is planning her lavish Halloween themed wedding at her Inn on the Green. Her fiancé has run the Inn’s kitchen for years, ably aided by his recent ex-wife, chef Mary Ann Dumas. An old friend of Riley’s, Mary Ann turns to her when the bride requests a spooky ice cream wedding cake.
But the weekend takes a frightful turn when Diantha is found dead and suspicion falls on Mary Ann. The cast of potential suspects is long—each wedding guest had a chilling motive to kill the vicious heiress. Can Riley unmask the murderer before another guest ends up on ice?
About the author
Meri Allen is the pen name of Shari Randall, the Agatha Award winning author of the beloved Lobster Shack Mystery series. Her Ice Cream Shop Mystery series stars Riley Rhodes, a former librarian for the CIA who enjoys applying her skills to the murders that always seem to crop up in the bucolic New England village she calls home. Shari, too, is a former librarian, and enjoys books, dancing, and visiting her globe-trotting children. You can follow Meri and Shari on Facebook and sign up for The Scoop Newsletter at meriallenbooks.com.
All comments are welcomed.