Barista Jen Hanby has been keeping a few secrets from her co-workers. The first being that the homeless man that she takes coffee and a pastry to on a regular bases is her father, and the second is her hand doesn't itch because she has eczema; it's because she gets messages from her spirit guide. Jen's hand, affectionately known as the hand of doom or HOD, is never wrong, so when she gets a message saying your boyfriend is cheating on you with your half sister, she knows it's true.

The real trouble begins when Jen goes to her hated half sister, Misty's, apartment and discovers her dead body. Things aren't looking so great when Jen becomes suspect number one but they become even worse when her homeless father turns into the prime suspect. Jen is determined to clear both her and her father's name, but in order to do that, she is going to have to learn how to control HOD, instead of it always controlling her.

I have been a fan of Wendy Roberts' since her Ghost Dusters series came out, so there was no way I was going to miss reading GROUNDS TO KILL. This fun, quirky mystery moves at a great pace and is full of interesting characters. The mystery behind Misty's killer took a bit of a backseat for me in relation to everything else that was going on. I was more invested in Jen's antics and the relationships she has with the people around her. I did get into the who-done-it mood towards the end of the book and was delightfully surprised to discover I was not able to figure out who the killer was. I always love it when a book is able to surprise you. If you love a good mystery full of interesting characters and a lot of coffee references, you're going to love GROUNDS TO KILL.

Book Summary

Barista Jen Hamby's coworkers give her a hard time for bringing coffee and pastries to a homeless man who sits outside her café—but she has a secret. The scruffy man is her father. She's also hiding the little matter of why her palm itches. But how can she explain that her hand has a mind of its own and writes messages from the beyond? Right. That'll get her Employee of the Month. When she finds herself scrawling your boyfriend is cheating on you! to herself on the bathroom mirror, she immediately dumps the guy. But then his little fling—who just happens to be her half sister—turns up dead, and suddenly Jen's homeless father is the prime suspect. Jen knows he is being framed and must take matters into her own hands to protect him. But will anyone believe that the crazy old man is innocent? Or that his spirit-writing daughter holds the truth