Winnie Archer’s Bread Over Troubled Water has aspiring photographer Ivy Culpepper racing not just to solve a murder, but to also to save her friends and her job at bakery Yeast of Eden from disaster. As the book opens, Ivy’s morning is focused on her normal routine of baking and on reflecting on her own to-do list for her impending wedding party. She does not have much free time, however, as the bread shop is a town staple and thus plenty of regulars and tourists pass through, keeping everyone busy. One such regular is Josh Prentiss. He is a well-known fixture in Yeast of Eden, working away most mornings on his laptop and offering charmingly flirtatious remarks to both customers and employees. After some light commotion in the shop resulting in dropped bread and a broken plate, he leaves the shop and Ivy does not think about him further, until her determined and charming pug, Agatha, sniffs out his body amongst flowers in the park and drags Ivy once more into a mystery.
Despite her intentions and warnings from both her fiancé and local law enforcement, Ivy finds herself compelled to look into the mysterious death. Locals begin to condemn Yeast of Eden as the culprit for Josh’s death and the news actively prints condemning articles driving people away from their doors. Moreover, Yeast of Eden’s owner, Olaya, is going through the personal tragedy of losing her brother and sister-in-law to a car accident and having to take in their only daughter. The accusations threaten to break what resolve she has left, and she pleads to Ivy to use her investigative talents to clear their name.
As she does, Ivy learns that Josh’s friendly demeanor hid a conniving manipulator. At his funeral she learns he was dating and scamming multitudes of older women out of their money, and that is merely the beginning of his smarmy behavior. It seems the more she learns about their departed loyal customer, the less she likes him. In addition, his behavior around town and in the past give Ivy a nearly unmanageably long list of people to investigate on her own. Luckily Ivy has her trusty friend Ms. Branford who is always up for an investigative adventure, and together they manage to get many people around town to admit to their true impressions of Josh, providing and thus provide a litany of motives for the murder.
Ivy Culpepper is an eager friend who just wants to help those close to her, all while trying to stay out of as much trouble as possible. She keeps a level head and manages to unravel the mystery as to WHICH of the multitudes could have wanted Josh Prentiss dead. She does her best to aid the police without actively getting in the way of their investigation, and only goes to them when she has solid evidence or leads that should be shared. Bread Over Troubled Water keeps the reader guessing the entire time.
While sympathy for the victim may wane a bit as more and more of Josh’s unsavory activities are uncovered, readers will remain invested in the solving of the crime for Ivy and Olaya’s sakes. Bread Over Troubled Water is the eighth installment in A Bread Shop Mystery series, but readers need not have read the prior seven to enjoy this addition due to descriptive backgrounds as characters are introduced and Ivy investigates. If someone is looking for a murder mystery that is well balanced with the everyday struggles of a reluctant investigator and the detailed steps of the investigative process, Bread Over Troubled Water is a must read. – Carla Schantz
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Carla Schantz is a Courthouse Clerk Supervisor and has a bachelor’s degree in English as well as a master’s in legal studies. Books have been a passion of hers since she was young, and she is a firm believer in the purse book so that she is never without a book at any time.