Search - Death of a Domestic Diva : A Toadfern Mystery

A very fun read, entertaining, and enjoyable. This was the first adult book that I've read in a long time that wasn't filled with cuss words or sex scenes. A great read that you would be comfortable giving to your teenager to read.

This is the first book in the Toadfern Mystery Series. Believe it or not, there is more than one Martha Stewart, and this one, Tyra Grimes, is coming to Paradise to shoot one of her shows featuring Josie and her stain-busting expertise. Or is she really coming for another reason altogether? Does someone know something about Tyra that could endanger her whole career? There is alot more dirty laundry in this book than Josie can barely handle. But with the help of her friends, she finally manages to get all the dirt out! A great set-up book to get to know the characters.

Is it sophomore syndrome? I just did not enjoy this Josie Toadfern Cozy Mystery nearly as much as the first one I read in the series, Death by Deep Dish Pie. Maybe it's the not-very-loose Martha Stewart tie-in..sigh..I'm pretty tired of Martha...

I love cozy mystery series, and I was excited to start a new one, but after finishing the book I am not nearly so excited. This book took almost 80 pages to get to the mystery, and at no point did I feel that I just couldn't put it down. I will keep the next book in the series on my TBR pile, but it will definitely be on the bottom.

Good book

Oh what you can learn from dirty laundry!

Reviewer: jadedromantic. "While waiting for Lemony Snicket's newest, I picked this up to read after coming upon it accidentally - I like to try "first in series" mysteries if I can, so that if I like them I can keep up from the beginning. Josie Toadfern lives in maybe the most rural Ohio town I've ever read about, Paradise. The book opens with several of Paradise's most prominent citizens scared stiff that Paradise has been left off the newest edition of the Ohio state map! The city's already low tourist-based cash crop is in peril, but how to get the city (literally) back on the map? Easy, says Josie, owner of Toadfern's Laundromat ("always a leap ahead of dirt!") and the best stain-removal expert in the midwest -- she'll just write to Tyra Grimes, who is a super-famous homemaking/decorating expert (a la Martha Stewart) with her own show, and tell Tyra she (Josie) should be on "The Tyra Grimes Home Show" to share her stain-fighting expertise with the world.

This idea comes with mostly-enthusiastic backing from other Paradisites -- with one of the most adamant exceptions being the local funeral parlor owner, Lewis Rothchild, who warns Josie that, if she gets Tyra to come to Paradise, "blood will flow." Josie receives a few other nay-sayers' advice, but writes the letter anyway ...

Sure enough, Tyra shows up in Paradise . . . and within 48 hours Josie stumbles upon a couple of bodies lying in a mushroom patch -- one unconscious, the other with a bullet hole in the chest...."

cozy mystery-set in a small town-books gives stain fighting advice.

There is no stain that laundromat owner Josie Toadfern can't conquer, and she's offered to share her expertise on world famous domestic doyenne Tyra Grimes's TV show. No one is more shocked that Josie herself when the Great Grimes shows up in Paradise, Ohio to tape a segment in Josie's teeny-weeny hometown. But rapidly spreading rumors of the insufferable icon's immoral - and quite possibly illegal - carryings-on have sparked Josie's curiosity and her uninvited sorting thourgh Grimes's dirty laundry is exposing all manner of dastardly doings - from mischeif all the way to murder. Toadfern soon realizes that it will take more than lemon juice to make this lethal stain come out in the wash.

The first in the Toadfern series and a bit slow going. I liked the main character and the "supporting" characters fine, but the plot itself was rather flat. The mystery was ok, but everything that led up to and and came afterwards was BORING! I hope the next one is better because it, and one other in the series, are already on my TBR pile.

Fun cozy.

fun read!