The story opens on St. Patrick's Day with sisters Bernie and Libby Simmons making pies for a customer of their bakery, A Little Taste of Heaven. After receiving a call from their brother Brandon, they leave the shop and meet him at the bar where he works, RJ's. When they arrive Brandon shows them the dead body of Mike Sweeney, a local business owner. He found the body when he came into work that morning. The boss shows up shortly thereafter and calls the police but continues to plan on opening the bar for his best business day of the year. Bernie and Libby promise their brother that they will look into the death.

It initially was difficult to figure out the relationships between the characters. The story assumes that you know the backstory from earlier novels in the series. Also, the dialogue between the sisters was so mundane I didn't know why it was part of the story. Another problem that I had was that there was no catering job that the sisters were involved with. The title assumes that a catered event is part of the plot. The only part of the novel about the March holiday is that the murder took place on St. Patrick's Day. No clues involved the holiday. I wonder whether the author wrote a generic story and later gave it a holiday title.

Alot of things didn't add up about this novel. Since this is the first Isis Crawford book I have read I won't be reading her in the future. ( )

I found this book at a library book sale where I put as many cozy mysteries as I could find into my $2.00 bag. I was intrigued by the idea of a St. Patrick's day mystery. It wasn't until later that I realized I'd already read a title in this series before (the Thanksgiving one I think).

I really didn't care for or about the characters. The interactions between Bernie and Libby get on my nerves--and I really have a hard time believing they have a thriving business with as often as Bernie pulls Libby (and herself) away from it and that they don't have a reliable helper in the kitchen.

The mystery really didn't have much to do with St. Patrick's Day other than happening around that time and the first murder being one involving green beer. That was a bit disappointing after looking forward to a St. Patrick's Day mystery.

There are 3 recipes included in the copy I read--unfortunately, they seem to be chosen at random and were not featured (or even mentioned that I remember) in the story itself. In most of the other cozies that include recipes, the recipes included figure into the story in some way. ( )

I generally dislike mystery novels that are lumped into a category called the "cozy", which is the category that this book falls into. When I found a new, unread copy of this book at my local library, I had to give it a go. Because of the number of books Ms. Crawford has written, I thought perhaps I should re-evaluate the genre.

I was familiar with these types of mysteries from my childhood. And as far as I'm concerned, that's the audience for this book. Great for kids, but adults should be able to read at a higher level. Thoughtful readers, looking for more than just badly written fluff, do not waste your time. Give this series a pass.
( )

A Catered St. Patrick's Day by Isis Crawford
Realize the author has put out other books along the same lines, just different holidays and after reading 1/2 of
the first page I know I will be hunting down the rest of the books to read.
Being as I do bake just listening, reading about how they are handling the dough makes me think I can learn something
from them by reading this book. The luck is with them, besides the 4 leaf clovers they have the kitchen witch there.
I remember making them to sell at craft shows.
Libby and Bernie run the bakery shop and live upstairs with their Dad.
Brandon is the bar tender that covers for the morning guy cuz he's in the hospital. Til he finds Mike out back.
Mike is dead and now Duncan is arrested. His aunt comes to his rescue and wants the family to find out who really did murder
Mike so Duncans' name can be cleared. The family (Libby, Bernie and their dad Sean) has done investigations before because they just know everybody in town and
how they are related to one another.
The girls start by visiting with Duncan and he tells them his story, several different ones. They then go visit with Brandon at the
bar as he's on duty to maybe run a few things past him.
Their father also is following up a lead with the guy who drives the hearse. They all get leads to other sources and trace them out as well.
What each of them has to go through to get the answers is sometimes too funny.
The best part of this book for me was their daily routine of making and baking the bread, priceless!
Good mystery story also. Can't wait to get the authors other holidays books. ( )

This story didn't have a catered event and barely touched on St. Patrick's Day. Like another reviewer, I wondered how the shop and the catering business survives, with the sisters time so consumed in investigating this murder. This was the first of the "Catered" series that I' have read and I couldn't read it fast enough because I couldn't wait for it to be over. Plot was not engrossing, nor were the characters. Not sure that I will pursue any others in this series. ( )