☀ Ladle to the Grave: Soup Lover's Mysteries [4] - Connie Archer

Thank you for joining us on the Virtual Book Tour for Ladle to the Grave, a Mystery by Connie Archer (3 March 2015, Berkley, 304 pages).

This is the fourth book in the Soup Lover's Mysteries series.

PREVIEW: Check out the book's synopsis and excerpt below, as well as details about all of the other books in the series, including the next instalment, A Clue In The Stew, which is currently available for pre-order.  Read the first four chapters of  Ladle to the Grave with Amazon Look Inside.

Author Connie Archer will be awarding a $20 Amazon/BN gift card to a randomly drawn winner via Rafflecopter during the tour.   Please do take part: comment on our post and follow the tour where you will be able to read other excerpts (☀) and reviews (✍).

Synopsis | Teaser | The Series | About the Author | Giveaway & Tour Stops

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Synopsis

By the Spoonful is Snowflake, Vermont’s most popular soup shop, but owner Lucky Jamieson doesn’t have any time to enjoy her success—she’s too busy trying to keep a lid on false accusations against her loved ones…

It’s almost May, and some of the local ladies have organized a pagan celebration in the woods to welcome spring. But the evening goes terribly wrong when one of the attendees winds up dead, apparently poisoned by an herbal concoction prepared by Lucky’s grandfather, Jack.

Lucky’s sure her grandfather could not have made such a tragic mistake. But before she can clear him of suspicion, her best friend, Sophie, is diverted from planning her wedding to By the Spoonful chef Sage DuBois when she finds a dead man floating in the creek on her property. Now it’s up to Lucky to get both Sophie and Jack out of hot water before a killer stirs up more trouble…

Recipes included!

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Teaser: Excerpt

     When Lucky reached Jack’s front porch, she was dismayed to see the windows dark. She heard thumps and banging and Jack’s voice crying out. He was inside, somewhere in the dark.
     Jack knew it was happening again. He couldn’t block out the screams. The boat was rising and falling in the sea. The water was purple with blood. A hand reached up from the dark waters. Jack grasped it and held on with all his strength. Then a quick glimpse of a shark’s fin, and the man was gone. He was holding a disembodied arm. All around him were the cries of men being torn to pieces. Jack sobbed. He couldn’t help them, no matter how quick he was, no matter how strong. He wasn’t fast enough to save them.
     Lucky pushed the door open and called Jack’s name. His moans were louder now. He had barricaded himself in the bathroom in an effort to control the memories. The sound of shattering glass came from within. She hurried to the kitchen and grabbed a small knife from the wooden block next to the stove. Just as she slid the edge of the blade into the doorframe, a heavy thud hit the door and Lucky fell back in shock, the knife falling from her hands. Her heart was racing. She pushed the knife into the doorjamb again and finally the lock released.
     Jack was slumped on the floor in a small pool of blood. Broken glass was everywhere. He was lost in his nightmare.
     “It’s okay now, Jack. You’re home. You’re safe.”
     He looked into her eyes, confused. “Lucky?”
     “You had a spell, but you’re okay now.”
     Tears spilled down Jack’s face. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
     “Nothing to be sorry about. Everything’s going to be all right now.” She prayed her words would make it true.

Ladle to the Grave
Available NOW!

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The Series: Soup Lover's Mysteries

A Spoonful of Murder | A Broth of Betrayal | A Roux of Revenge | A Clue in the Stew |

Click on the book cover to Look Inside the book on Amazon and read an excerpt.

A Spoonful of Murder [1]

Winter is big business in small-town Snowflake, Vermont. Tourists arrive to hit the ski slopes--and what could be more satisfying after a chilly day of carving powder than a steaming bowl of soup?

When Lucky Jamieson inherits her parents' soup shop, By the Spoonful, she realizes it's time to take stock of her life. Should she sell her parents' house or move in herself? Does she really want to run a restaurant business? And what about her grandfather Jack, who seems to be showing signs of Alzheimer's?

But her life decisions are moved to the back burner after an icy blonde tourist is found frozen to death behind the soup shop. and Lucky is bowled over when her soup chef, Sage DuBois, is led out of the kitchen by the police. As suspicion and speculations snowball, Lucky decides that the only way to save her employee and her business is to find out herself who iced the tourist--and landed her chef in the soup...

Recipes included!

[Published 7 August 2012, 303 pages]

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A Broth of Betrayal [2]

Even a town called Snowflake, Vermont, has a summer season. In August, Lucky Jamieson’s By the Spoonful serves chilled soups—celery and green onion, cream of asparagus—and salads. The shop also serves as a gathering place to talk about cold-blooded murder…

A protest to stop the construction of an ugly car wash in the middle of the town’s picturesque Village Green is interrupted by the discovery of a skeleton that may date back to the Revolutionary War. While the remains pose a historical mystery, a present-day murder shakes the town to its core when local auto mechanic Harry Hodges is found dead in his shop.

Straining the patience of Chief of Police Nate Edgerton, Lucky soon finds herself in the soup again when her dear friend Elizabeth, the Mayor of Snowflake, goes missing. No matter how much trouble she has to stir up, Lucky is determined to use her noodle to uncover a killer and recover her friend…

Recipes included!

[Published 2 April 2013, 304 pages]

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A Roux of Revenge [3]

STIRRING UP TROUBLE

Snowflake, Vermont, is known for its skiing in winter—and its soup all year round, thanks to Lucky Jamieson’s By the Spoonful. Autumn brings golden leaves, pumpkin rice soup, the annual Harvest Festival…and murder.

Lucky’s soup shop is busier than usual this October, with groups of itinerant travelers in town to work the Harvest Festival. One newcomer seems to take a particular interest in Lucky’s young waitress, Janie, spying on her from across the street. Is the stranger stalking Janie?

After an unidentified man is found murdered in a van by the side of the road, simmering suspicions about the travelers are brought to a boil. But when Janie is put in harm’s way, Lucky must join forces with the travelers to turn up the heat on a killer…

Recipes included!

[Published 1 April 2014, 305 pages]

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A Clue in the Stew [5]

**Available for pre-order**

Soup shop owner Lucky Jamieson stirs up more trouble in the latest mystery from the national bestselling author of Ladle to the Grave...

When Lucky Jamieson opens up By the Spoonful to host an event with a famous author, she’s not expecting a bunch of nuts to descend on her small-town soup shop. But the author’s exasperating entourage—from a prickly publicist to a snippy son and his tipsy wife—give fresh meaning to the phrase, too many cooks spoil the broth.

The evening is more than spoiled, however, when it ends with a homicide. When the manner of the murder—as well as another recent unsolved crime—echoes the author’s fiction, Police Chief Nate Edgerton realizes he has a copycat killer on his hands. And Lucky hopes that one of her regular customers who has mysteriously gone missing isn’t involved. Once again, the soup shop owner will need to stir up some clues to find her friend and catch a cunning killer—before things really take a tureen for the worse...

[Published 5 April 2016, 320 pages]

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About the Author

Connie Archer is the national bestselling author of the Soup Lover’s Mystery series from Penguin Random House (Berkley Prime Crime), which is set in the imaginary village of Snowflake, Vermont.

A Clue in the Stew will be released in April 2016.

Connie was born and raised in New England and now lives on the other coast.

Follow Connie Archer:

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Giveaway and Tour Stops

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