This series started out strong, as a great cozy without the cutesy vibe, with strong writing and clever mysteries. I think, though, with number 5, I'm done. The author broke one of my personal cardinal rules by creating character relationships and dynamics that I like, and then breaking them up and shuffling them about, and then doing it in a manner that was clumsy and awkward.

The mystery plotting was complex enough, but tried to be too clever, so that by the end it felt like a Ginsu knife commercial: But wait! There's More!. Had the author - or the editor - pared it down just a bit, it might have offered a more suspenseful ending.

It wasn't a bad mystery, or story; it just wasn't great and certainly didn't match the caliber of the earlier books. While it might be a blip, the relationship shuffle has left me uninterested in finding out. ( )

Author's guest post at my blog:
https://bookfare.blogspot.com/2021/10/foodfic-please-welcome-cynthia-kuhn.html

Lila Maclean is an English Literature professor at Stonedale College. She's taken a sabbatical at the home of Bibi Callahan, whom Lila has recently discovered is her favorite author, Isabella Dare. While no one knows the secret but her, Bibi was so taken with Lila that she asked her to stay and help organize her files during her sabbatical.

But when Lila accidentally comes across an old manuscript of Bibi's that has never been published, she doesn't expect it to cause problems, she merely wants Bibi to publish it. But while Bibi insists it's a work of fiction, there's some truth to it. It's the tale of the night her only sister Ilse disappeared, and her own thoughts as to who could be involved. Unwittingly, Lila lets it slip that the manuscript exists when the Larks visit - three women who have been friends with Bibi since childhood - and when one of them is later found dead and the manuscript is missing, it now becomes a murder investigation.

While the police are looking into the murder, they don't believe the manuscript has anything to do with it. Bibi asks for Lila's help in finding out where the manuscript is, and who could do something like this; but when Lila starts finding answers, they aren't the ones Bibi and her friends want to know. And without anyone to help her searching for clues, she must depend on herself - and maybe the reluctant detective assigned to the case - to ferret out a killer who might just get away with murder...

This is the fifth book in the Lila Maclean Academic Mysteries, and as such, is just as good as the others, which is saying something. Lila's life has always been a bit stressful; not just being a professor who's trying to achieve tenure, but her recent breakup with another homicide detective still has her reeling. While she's found a moment of peace with Bibi, the murder changes all that.

Still, Lila seems to thrive on mystery in her life. She's intelligent, thorough, can manage her professional life and her personal one even while one or the other isn't going the way she'd like it to go. Lila is a woman I think I'd like to have as a friend. Her intensity, dedication to her work and friends, and generous nature are all part of this book.

But the story goes deeper than what Bibi wrote in the manuscript. For of course, she only has her version of what might have happened to work with. When the ending comes, the murderer is revealed, more than the truth comes out, it's both sad and horrifying, in a way; yet when there's closure - in more ways than one - it allows people to move on with their lives and decide what they truly want.

Ms. Kuhn's ability to tell a story that pulls the reader in from the beginning and keep them there through the end is shown in this book. She brings you easily into Lila's life, the people around her, and you get to experience her thought process as she investigates. It's a captivating tale of murder that leaves you wanting more. Highly recommended. ( )