Cherringham – Murder by Moonlight: A Cosy Crime Series (Episode 3)

In this third “episode” of the series, Jack Brennan and Sarah Edwards team up to learn who killed Kristy Kimball. Sarah, a web designer, moved back to Cherrington when her marriage broke up. Jack, a retired New York detective, moved to the small (fictional) English village after his wife died.

Kristy, who owns a gift shop, dies from anaphylactic shock while walking the short lane to her house after rehearsal with the Rotary choir. She tries to use her EpiPen (Epi for epinephrine), but it doesn’t work. Before leaving Rotary, she ate some oatmeal raisin cookies. Kristy’s death is treated as an unfortunate accident until her best friend asks Sarah and Jack to look into it. Beth worries that someone planted a cookie and deliberately tampered with the EpiPen.

For rest of the book, Sarah and Jack question suspects, then meet to compare notes. Once the killer is exposed, a cheery aftermath shows Cherrington is back to normal. Both authors have background in television, and the storyline does have the tone of an hour-long television mystery. For this reader, after Kristy’s death on the path, the rest of the scenes lacked tension, and the culprit wasn’t a surprise.