Book of the Month: June

My best book for June, 2019 is Susan Wittig Albert's A Plain Vanilla Murder.  In this cozy mystery a botany professor is killed. He has been working to produce a hybrid vanilla plant, a form of the orchid plant, that was disease resistant. The professor was also involved in smuggling orchid plants into the U. S. and selling them at horticulture shows throughout the country. At times this book seemed like a political mystery, which is quite unusual for the series. Whodunnit? Maybe the ex-wife who has a competing business, the grad student the victim screwed out of a plant patent, any one of a number of young female students he had affairs with, or jealous faculty members. I particularly liked the recipes at the end of the book for vanilla sugar, vanilla paste, vanilla syrup, vanilla butter and vanilla whipped cream. I wrote them down for future reference.

I thought this installment of the China Bayles Mystery series was one of the most intricately plotted books in the series.  It is the 27th book in the series.