Gift baskets for every occasion and delicious candies that harken back to childhood: the tourist town of Fredericksburg, Texas, seems an idyllic place to start a business. But nothing is ever as simple as it seems.

 

When a dead body is discovered in Tally Holt’s Olde Tyme Sweets, her problems of finding reliable employees, keeping her business afloat, and dealing with the many women left brokenhearted by her brother don’t seem as important anymore. She’s more concerned about her best friend, Yolanda, who is the first person the police suspect. The list of suspects grows wider, making Tally wonder who she can trust.

 

In this cozy mystery, the twists and turns of the plot keep coming: who killed Gene, the adopted son of the mayor, who seems to have dated as many women as Tally’s brother and also has financial trouble? Half the town seems to have a motive, and everyone had the opportunity. In such a small town, gossip spreads at the hair salon and at yard sales, through snippets of conversation overheard in the coffee shop and burger joint and Rathskeller, as Tally and Yolanda try to figure out who might have set them up—and why.

 

Along the way, Tally and Yolanda try to start new romances (always tricky, when the person you date has reason to think you killed someone), Tally discusses clues with the Maine coon cat her brother added to her household, and readers learn some of the charming peculiarities of Fredericksburg, such as Sunday Houses and the Yard Sale Underground. This novel is a great kickoff to a new series from Kaye George, one that I hope will continue with many more books about Tally and Yolanda.