Twisted Tea Christmas

The Twisted Tea Christmas is the 23rd installment of the Indigo Teashop Mystery series by Laura Childs.  While I have heavily criticized her writing in the past 5 years, this novel puts her back on track. It is fantastic. I always love it when the murder occurs quickly so that the rest of the book can be about the solving of the murder.  Here, we have a murder on the 5th page and is is not resolved until the second to last page.  The publisher's summary is below:

Tea maven Theodosia Browning and her tea sommelier, Drayton Connelley, are catering a Victorian Christmas party at a swanky mansion in downtown Charleston for Drucilla Hayward, one of the wealthiest women in town. As the champagne flows and the tea steeps, Drucilla is so pleased with the success of her soiree that she reveals her secret plan to Theodosia.  The grande dame has brought the cream of Charleston society together to reveal that she is planning to give her wealth away to various charitable organizations. However, before she can make the announcement, Theodosia finds her crumpled unconscious in the hallway. It looks like the excitement has gotten to the elderly women, but it may have been helped along by the syringe in her neck.  

I am happy that there were no cheesy statements like "the phone rang ding-a-ling-ring" and that secondary character Delaine Dish's emotions were under control.  The main change that I liked is that the murder did not occur in the same place as it did in the prior 22 books.  It was time for a change and we now have a perfectly plotted and written cozy mystery to enjoy.  There was something else new that tickled my fancy. One evening when Theodosia went to bed with a book, it was a  book written by Susan Wittig Albert!  Albert writes the China Bayles cozy mystery series. I have to wonder if Childs and Albert are friends.

The Charleston setting was a good choice to place the series in.  It has marvelous architecture, fairly nice weather and history galore.  It gives the writer alot to work with when creating atmosphere. The main characters are Theodosia, Drayton and police investigator Burt Tidwell.  These characters have grown over the years but in Twisted Tea Christmas they do not have growth, they just work together to solve the murder. I loved this as I am mainly a whodunnit fan. Author Childs gives us plenty of red herrings, more than we usually have in her books. It made the novel suspenseful.  In fact, I had a hard time figuring out who committed the murder and was surprised at the ending.  

I am proud to give this book a rating of 5 out of 5 stars. Ya'll need to read this one.