A Murder Yule Regret
A Murder Yule Regret (A Bread Shop Mystery)
by Winnie Archer
About A Murder Yule Regret
A Murder Yule Regret (A Bread Shop Mystery)
Cozy Mystery
7th in Series
Publisher : Kensington Cozies (November 30, 2021)
Mass Market Paperback : 304 pages
ISBN-10 : 149673355X
ISBN-13 : 978-1496733559
Digital ASIN : B08Y69YZKB
Freelance photographer and Yeast of Eden bakery assistant Ivy Culpepper has just scored the job of a lifetime shooting the Dickensian dress-up X-mas party thrown by It Girl film actress Eliza Fox . . . until an unwanted guest appears.
A holiday costume party in the sleepy coastal town of Santa Sofia could be just the boost Ivy needs for her fledgling photography business. At the party, Ivy enters a Victorian fantasy come to life, all courtesy of the fabulous Ms. Fox. Ivy gets to play shutterbug while hanging with Scrooge, Marley, the Cratchits, and more classic Dickens characters. But what begins as the best of times turns out to be the very worst for one of the party guests—a tabloid journalist with more enemies than Ebenezer himself.
When the man’s body is found sprawled across the jagged rocks below the house, the fingers begin pointing at Eliza. Meanwhile, Ivy gets roped into helping prove the starlet’s innocence. Her festive photos are now official evidence—and the Ghosts of Christmas Present could mean the party for Eliza is over, once and for all.ance photographer and Yeast of Eden bakery assistant Ivy Culpepper has just scored the job of a lifetime shooting the Dickensian dress-up X-mas party thrown by It Girl film actress Eliza Fox . . . until an unwanted guest appears.
A holiday costume party in the sleepy coastal town of Santa Sofia could be just the boost Ivy needs for her fledgling photography business. At the party, Ivy enters a Victorian fantasy come to life, all courtesy of the fabulous Ms. Fox. Ivy gets to play shutterbug while hanging with Scrooge, Marley, the Cratchits, and more classic Dickens characters. But what begins as the best of times turns out to be the very worst for one of the party guests—a tabloid journalist with more enemies than Ebenezer himself.
When the man’s body is found sprawled across the jagged rocks below the house, the fingers begin pointing at Eliza. Meanwhile, Ivy gets roped into helping prove the starlet’s innocence. Her festive photos are now official evidence—and the Ghosts of Christmas Present could mean the party for Eliza is over, once and for all.
Excerpt
“Dammit, stop,” someone snapped. “It’s over.”
I glanced to my left in time to see a man dressed all in black—another chimney sweep; they were a dime a dozen—storming away from a petite young woman, a black shawl around her shoulders. She stared after the retreating figure, lips trembling from the rebuke, before throwing her shoulders back in defiance. She held her head high, spun around, and marched away. You’ll be okay, I wanted to
tell her. There are other fish in the sea.
I looked around again, searching for the party’s host. Still no Eliza, but Nicole stood off to one side of the stairs. She’d changed into a full-skirted period dress. Her hair and makeup were done so perfectly that she could have been the real deal—a woman straight out of Dickens’s England. Only her frown as she stared at the guests and the clipboard she held in the crook of her arm kept her firmly rooted in the present.
I followed her line of sight straight to a server weaving through the crowd, heading to the door leading to the small backyard. Nicole tried to beckon to the girl, pointing to the stairs. Eliza’s big moment must be imminent, and Nicole wanted everyone present, but the server didn’t notice.
I turned back to see Nicole shake her head, clearly exasperated. Meanwhile, a slow clapping began. It grew louder and faster. A few whoops and hollers rose above the frenetic crowd as Eliza Fox appeared at the top of the stairs. I watched with everyone else for a moment before I started snapping photos. Eliza slowly descended the stairs looking like a princess, the crowd below her adoring subjects. She paused at the landing halfway down, tilting her head coquettishly and fluttering her fingers in a wave. Her Dickens costume was unexpected, yet somehow perfect. She was a female Scrooge in a cream dressing gown and nightcap, her golden hair in a single braid draping over one shoulder.
I took more pictures as she threw her head back and gave a jaunty laugh. “Thank you all for coming tonight and for indulging me in my love of Dickens.” She could see everyone from her position, and she stood silently for a moment taking them all in, nodding hellos here and there. For the briefest moment, her gaze hitched and her smile wavered, but she summoned it back and continued acknowledging her guests. But then she froze again. This time the color drained from her face, making her look all the more like Scrooge when he encountered the Ghost of Christmas Past and faced the realities of his childhood.
Eliza Fox, though, really was a good actress. Just as quickly as her face had come undone, she put it back together. Whatever—or whoever—had spooked her had been pushed to some hidden compartment in her mind. The air in the crowded room suddenly felt stale and heavy. I shook off the feeling of claustrophobia and turned around to try to see whom Eliza had been looking at, but all I saw was a wall of nineteenth-century Londoners, along with the modern-day servers in their black and white.
I spotted Zac by the bar, clutching a tray filled with appetizers with both hands. I didn’t blame him. Balancing the tray on an open palm seemed like a disaster waiting to happen in the crowded room.
Beside me, Maggie squealed. “She’s so beautiful, isn’t she?”
“She is,” I said, but something about the expression that had passed over Eliza’s face bothered me. It had looked like fear or shock, or a combination of both.
About Winner Archer
Winnie Archer is the nationally bestselling author of the Bread Shop Mystery series, and the Magical Dressmaking Mystery series written as Melissa Bourbon. A former middle school English teacher, lives in North Carolina with her educator husband, Carlos, and the youngest of their five children. She can be found online at MelissaBourbon.com.
Author Links
Kensington: https://www.kensingtonbooks.com/9781496724410/dough-or-die/
Website: https://melissabourbon.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MelissaBourbonWinnieArcherBooks
Purchase Links – Amazon – B&N – Kobo – IndieBound
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This sounds so good and a good read at any time of the year. Thank you for giving away print copies for those of us that can do tech and buy all my books in print. Wishing you a lot of new followers peggy clayton
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