A Stiff Risotto: Amazon.ca: Lou Jane Temple: Books

Product Description

Review

"Lou Jane Temple simmers up a delicious plot of intrigue and suspense."--Author and Chef Rozanne Gold

Product Description

The knives are out!

Heaven Lee-- proprietress extraordinaire of Kansas City's celebrated Cafe Heaven-- knew she had to watch her back at Aspen's gossipy Real Dish Food Festival. But it wasn't until the saucy cook stumbled across the battered body of one of the Best Chef contestants that she realized how deadly the competition could be.

Every June, five thousand gourmands from across the globe gather in the chic resort town of Aspen, sipping wine in the pristine mountain air as five celebrity chefs battle for the Best Chef title. When the competitors start to drop, there's a bountiful supply of suspects. The intrepid Heaven discovers scores to settle, Hollywood ambitions, and outright malice before making sure a vicious killer gets their just deserts!

See all Product Description

Inside This Book (Learn More)

First Sentence
LINDA Lunch had heartburn. Read the first page

Explore More
Concordance

Browse Sample Pages
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover

Tag this product

(What's this?)

Think of a tag as a keyword or label you consider is strongly related to this product.
Tags will help all customers organize and find favorite items.

Customer Reviews

7 Reviews

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

Average Customer Review

3.1 out of 5 stars (7 customer reviews)

Share your thoughts with other customers:

Create your own review

Most helpful customer reviews

3.0 out of 5 stars Still Not A Cozy Mystery, Jan 12 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: A Stiff Risotto (Paperback)

I had received this entire series as a gift and am reviewing them as I read them. I didn't like the first book in the series, "Death By Rhubarb," and absolutely hated the second book, " Revenge Of The Barbeque Queens."

In my review of "Death By Rhubarb" I had said that many of these series take awhile to get going and don't show much improvement until the 3rd or 4th book.

This is the 3rd book and this book is a great improvement over the first two books.

Heaven Lee, owner of Cafe Heaven in Kansas City and two of her employee's Chris Snyder and Joe Long are on their way to Aspen Colorado for the Real Dish Food Festival and the crowning of the Best Chef.

Accidents abound and when a body is found Heaven and her trusted employee's try to find out if someone is trying to kill off the competition or kill off the Festival itself.

Meanwhile back in Kansas City, Murray, the former New York Times Crime Reporter has been left in charge of Cafe Heaven, with some very funny results.

I really enjoyed this book, all the returning characters seem to be more fleshed out and real. I like the simultaneous storylines of, Heaven in Aspen and Murray in Kansas City.

New characters were still a little flat, but much more interesting and easy to remember than characters in the previous books who all seemed to blend together and made the reading very difficult.

After being regulated to a couple of lines in the second book, my two favorite characters from the first book, Chris and Murray are both heavily involved in the story. And even better, the only character I liked from the second book, Gorgeous, Hispanic, Texan barbequer, Bo Morales shows up again with his chuckwagon and mules.

I disliked Heaven Lee in the previous books but I like her a little in this one, she's not so eccentric. I also liked that the relationship between her and her twenty years younger "boyfriend" Hank was almost nil. There is just no chemistry in this relationship, although I think she does have great chemistry with a couple of other guys in the book.

The recipes are still a problem in this book, they're dropped right in the middle of the page, story just stops, recipe, story starts up again. I've started the next book and this problem seems to be solved. I know it's probably an editing problem not authors.

This is not a cozy mystery because there is too liberal a use of both the "F*" word and other profanities by both Heaven and other characters. A lot of sexual innuendo's between the characters.

All in all, this was an enjoyable read. It made me look forward to the next book. Hopefully, the writing will continue to improve and the rating continue to go up.

Help other customers find the most helpful reviews

Was this review helpful to you? Yes No

Report abuse

4.0 out of 5 stars Humourous, Jun 13 2002

By

"barbcaulk" (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Stiff Risotto (Paperback)

I just finished reading this short novel. It is the third book I have read by Lou Jane Temple. I like Heaven Lee's style of mystery solving. Combine all that food makes for an interesting and light read. I have been reading a lot of heavy books lately and wanted something humourous and light. I was glad I chose this book. The characters, even though there are many, are delightful. The several plots at one time were somewhat had to figure out how each one played out. But I enjoyed trying to figure out the who did it throughout. Wasn't who I expected. Didn't know to the last few pages and the reason behide it.

Help other customers find the most helpful reviews

Was this review helpful to you? Yes No

Report abuse

2.0 out of 5 stars Only pretty good, Jun 27 2001

By

Sarah (Houghton, MI United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Stiff Risotto (Paperback)

I did not find a lot of depth where the characters were concerned. The really interesting sections of the book were the recipes. The situations that the characters faced were humorous, but not my favorite series. If you do like this kind of book, try the San Francisco based Angie Amalfi series by Joanne Pence.

Help other customers find the most helpful reviews

Was this review helpful to you? Yes No

Report abuse

Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review

› See all 7 customer reviews on Amazon.ca

Want to see more reviews on this item?

› Go to Amazon.com to see all 8 reviews 3.4 out of 5 stars

Most recent customer reviews

1.0 out of 5 stars The Pits
Instead of getting better, this series has gotten worse with each book.

Once again, there's no rhyme or reason whatsoever for Heaven to involve herself in this mystery. Read more

Published on Feb 5 2002

2.0 out of 5 stars A Stiff Risotto
The adventures of a restaurant owner and two of her waiters who go to Aspen for a Chef's competition, and the challenges of the restaurant staff to run things while she's gone... Read more