Sour Cherry Season

A culinary cozy mystery where the town's favorite pie may contain a confession nobody wants served.

The Orchard County Fair in Vessey's Bend, Indiana, smells of cherries, cider, and local pride. Dorothy Meade is ready to judge the celebrated pie class. She is less ready for a rival judge who seems determined to question every decision she makes.

Cookbook keeper Ruth-Anne Pell has been studying the town's treasured sour-cherry recipe. Something about its odd measurements troubles her, and she wants a private word with Dorothy. Before that conversation can happen, Ruth-Anne is found dead in the orchard's sorting shed. Her marked cookbook is missing.

A fallen stack of cherry crates offers a tidy explanation. Dorothy's beagle Reserve finds reason to linger, and Dorothy sees details that don't fit an accident. Now she must read a recipe as carefully as an entry card—and decide whether generations of bakers have been following instructions that mean more than they say.

With Cynthia Rell needling her at the judging bench and tension creeping into her relationship with Del Rourke, Dorothy has plenty to distract her. But someone killed to stop Ruth-Anne's discovery. Finding the message hidden in a beloved tradition could expose a secret at the heart of the orchard itself.

Sour Cherry Season is Book 7 of The County Fair Mysteries, serving up a food-centered whodunit, sharp wit, and a community whose sweetest claim to fame has a troubling history.

For readers who love:

•   Culinary clues and recipes with hidden meanings

•   Orchard towns, church cookbooks, and local traditions

•   Competitive older heroines and judging-bench rivalries

•   Beagle mischief and romance tested by real life