Friday, October 1, 2010

A Brisket, A Casket-Delia Rosen

A Brisket, A Casket
Delia Rosen
Kensington, Oct 1 2010, $6.99
ISBN: 9780758241702

After her marriage fell apart and her Uncle Murray died, Gwen Katz Silver moved down to Nashville, Tennessee to take over her inheritance, the only kosher deli in town. Gwen looks on it as a new start and becomes familiar with all the employees except the manager Thomasina who was her late uncle’s lover. Business is good until Kosher Karaoke Night when Buster Sergeant just keeled over and died.

The deceased was a powerful business man so his death got media attention upsetting a lot of folks. People start boycotting the restaurant. The police detective Beau McClintock informs Gwen that the victim was murdered with coyote poison that was injected into his food. Other dangerous things happen to Gwen as she investigates the workings of the restaurant. Someone locks her in the freezer so she can die. The list of vendors that her uncle used is missing and must be found because using the yellow pages leads to hilarious situations but doesn’t bring in any customers. Another individual business mogul Royce Sinclair offers to buy her property in order to change it into a resort. However, Gwen has forensics skills that she applies bringing her closer to a killer.

This is Gwen’s tale as she takes over from her late uncle the pastrami swami; if her personality can be summed up in one word it would be moxie. She knows something is not kosher at the deli and is determined to find what that is even risking her life. Gwen is obstinate as her friends know they can slightly nudge her, but never budge her once she makes up her mind. The support cast is everyday people who enhance understanding of the feisty heroine as she works to save the deli and identify the killer in an entertaining cuisine amateur sleuth.

Harriet Klausner

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