Final Fondue (A Five-Ingredient Mystery)
Cozy Mystery
3rd in Series
Publisher: Kensington (June 28, 2016)
Mass Market Paperback: 304 pages

Synopsis

Val Deniston certainly has her plate full running a café, dabbling with recipes, and helping her grandfather prepare for the town’s upcoming tri-centennial celebration, but she’s grown fond of her new life in the Chesapeake Bay town of Bayport. . .

So when Val is asked to reclaim her old position as a cookbook publicist in New York City, she puts off her decision in order to help her grandfather perfect his chocolate fondue for the weekend festivity’s dessert cook-off. But after the opening ceremonies, Val finds a houseguest strangled to death in her grandfather’s backyard. She suspects a classic case of mistaken identity, especially when another guest nearly bids her life a fondue farewell. Now it’s up to Val to keep the killer from making another stab at murder . . .

Includes 6 five-ingredient recipes!

Guest Post

Love, Fondue, and Murder

Few dishes elicit images of convivial gatherings and romantic encounters better than fondue. Evenings at ski lodges, a group sitting around a crackling fire, dipping fresh bread in melted cheese. Wedding receptions with fountains of molten chocolate and mounds of fresh fruit and cake for dipping. A candlelit tête-à-tête with bowls of warm chocolate surrounded by heart-shaped strawberries. Love, fondue, and murder intertwine in the third of my Five-Ingredient Mysteries. Final Fondue explores varieties of romantic love. Like chocolate fondue, love is both sweet and dark.

Val Deniston, my café manager sleuth, lives with her widowed grandfather in a tourist town on the Eastern Shore of Maryland near the Chesapeake Bay. The story takes place during a festival commemorating the 300th anniversary of the town’s founding. As Granddad readies his Victorian house for weekend visitors to the festival, he discovers a fondue pot in the attic. For him fondue conjures memories of friends talking and laughing while sharing a pot of melted cheese or chocolate. Reminiscing about fondue parties in the 1960s and 70s, he makes chocolate fondue to welcome his houseguests.

They’ve come to town, not only to enjoy the Tricentennial festivities, but also to plan a wedding. The would-be bride, best man, maid of honor, and a bridesmaid have reserved rooms in the house Val shares with her grandfather, while the groom stays at his parents’ bayfront estate. Val finds it odd that the parents haven’t invited his fiancée, but that’s not the only odd thing about this group. The friendly gathering Granddad planned turns into a contest, as the guests vie for control of the fondue pot. The best man uses an assembly line approach, dipping and eating cake cubes as fast as possible. The maid of honor blocks access to the fondue by holding her skewer of chocolate-dipped strawberries over the pot so the others can’t get their forks in edgewise. The bridesmaid drops fruit into the melted chocolate and goes on fishing expeditions to retrieve it. Pointed barbs fly across the table between her and the maid of honor. What’s behind the enmity between them? Are they both vying for the attention of the best man or are they jealous of each other’s relationship with the bride? Is the best man carrying a torch for the groom’s fiancée? When the bride arrives late, the others make room for her fork in the fondue pot, but she scorns the chocolate.

Later in the evening, one of the houseguests raids the fridge for leftovers and holds a solo fondue party in the backyard. Then a murderer joins the private party. After Val stumbles over a dead body in the dark, she comes to a chilling conclusion: The victim could have been mistaken for someone else. And a killer who makes a mistake the first time might try again. To prevent that from happening, Val and Granddad team up to identify and trap the murder. But first they have to figure out who the intended victim was and plumb the dark side of love—possessiveness and jealousy.

About the Author

Maya Corrigan lives near Washington, D.C., within easy driving distance of Maryland’s Eastern Shore, the setting for this series. She has taught courses in writing, detective fiction, and American literature at Georgetown University and NOVA community college. A winner of the Daphne du Maurier Award for Excellence in Mystery and Suspense, she has published essays on drama and short stories under her full name of Mary Ann Corrigan.

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