Sour Apples (An Orchard Mystery, #6)

by Sheila Connolly

Apple orchard owner Meg Corey is finally feeling settled into her new life in Granford--she's made friends, and her relationship with Seth Chapin is heating up--when her old Boston coworker Lauren Converse comes barreling into town, running the Congressional campaign for a former hometown football hero. But Meg doesn't have time to worry about why Seth seems reluctant to back Lauren's campaign when her neighbor, local dairy farmer Joyce Truesdell, is found dead from an apparent kick to the head from one of her cows.

When an autopsy shows that the fatal blow actually came from a weapon, Meg is even more troubled. Popular opinion points to Joyce's husband as the culprit, but Meg can't help wondering if someone wanted the outspoken dairy farmer out of the way--but why? She'll have to find out who had a beef with the victim, before she's the next one to get creamed...

INCLUDES DELICIOUS RECIPES

• ISBN10: 0425251500
• ISBN13: 9780425251508
• Publish Date: 7 August 2012 (first published 1 August 2012)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Publisher: Penguin Putnam Inc
• Imprint: Penguin USA
• Format: Paperback (US Mass Market)
• Pages: 304
• Language: English
• URL: https://penguinrandomhouse.com/books/isbn/9780425251508

Reviews

[MurderByDeath]

This book was really just all right. It's hard for me to really like the characters or care about them and the mystery itself was sort of flat, although it had an interesting premise. The murderer isn't obvious, buy why the murders were committed is, so the 'reveal' just wasn't all the surprising.

I like reading about the orchard and her struggles as she becomes a 'farmer', but I think the author struggles with the dialogue - characters come across as surly and unpleasant, when it's obvious we're supposed to like them (I am thinking of Bree most of all). The dialogue between Meg and her romantic interest, Seth, has zero spark - so it's a bit hard to care about that relationship either. The book picks up at the end, and there's enough to like about it that I'll probably go on to the next book in the series - but these will never sit near the top of the TBR pile.