A Matter of Hive and Death (An Oregon Honeycomb Mystery, #2)

by Nancy Coco

When a bee wrangler is bludgeoned, Let It Bee honey shop owner Wren Johnson makes it her beeswax to solve the crime in Nancy Coco’s second Oregon Honeycomb Mystery…
 

For the picturesque town of Oceanview on the Oregon Coast, May brings blossoming fruit trees and the annual UFO festival. As Aunt Eloise tries out alien costumes on their Havana brown cat Everett, Wren is off to meet with a bee wrangler, her go-to guy for local fruit tree honey.
 
But when she arrives, Elias Brentwood is lying on the ground amidst destroyed hives and a swarm of angry bees. The bees didn’t kill him, a blow to the head did. As blue-eyed Officer Jim Hampton investigates and the town is invaded by its own swarm of conspiracy theorists and crackpots, Wren and Aunt Eloise decide the only way to catch the bee wrangler’s killer is to set up a sting…
 

• ISBN10: 1496735625
• ISBN13: 9781496735621
• Publish Date: 29 March 2022
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Imprint: Kensington
• Format: Paperback (US Mass Market)
• Pages: 320
• Language: English
• URL: https://penguinrandomhouse.com/books/isbn/9781496735621

Reviews

[annieb123]

Originally posted on my blog: Nonstop Reader.

A Matter of Hive and Death is the second book in the Oregon Honeycomb small-town cozy mystery series by Nancy Coco. Due out 29th March 2021 from Kensington, it's 320 pages and will be available in paperback, audio, and ebook formats. It's worth noting that the ebook format has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links. I've really become enamored of ebooks with interactive formats.

This is the follow-up "small town" shop cozy mystery by a very well-loved veteran author. For fans of the genre, this one ticks all the boxes including a punny title, recipes included, clean language, not-terribly-gory murder, a likable female amateur sleuth, a foreshadowed slow-burn romantic interest, and a cat "sidekick" & adorable elderly aunt who help her solve the mystery. If it is, admittedly, trope-y and formulaic, it also has everything that fans of these series (including me) love. The pacing is good and doesn't drag. The dialogue can be a bit over the top and unnaturally stilted occasionally, but all in all, it's a fun and undemanding read with a satisfying denouement and resolution. I also found it a little odd that the recipes were scattered throughout between chapters instead of being gathered into an appendix at the back. It affected the continuity of reading for me more than I would have expected. (Not a huge deal, but noticeable). I tried the honey-blueberry muffins and the recipe works quite well as written and the addition of honey makes the muffins very moist (and even better the next day!).

Four stars. A strong follow-up to a promising cozy series with a likeable protagonist and the expected small-town eccentric characters and vibe. Real-life beekeepers might notice a questionable factoid or two in the story, but overall, I was impressed with the level of background research on beekeeping on the part of the author. I also really liked it that the main character's shop "Let it Bee" also incorporates a glass walled observation hive. Bees are fascinating and deserve all the good PR they can get.
Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.