WHOLE LATTE MURDER by Lena Gregory

"A Good Story About Friendship and Community"

Whole Latte Murder

Genres: Mystery Cozy | Mystery Amateur Sleuth

Posted: May 21, 2021

Gia Morelli is helping her friend Savannah figure out how to cut costs on Savannah’s upcoming wedding. When Savannah goes missing while showing a vacant house to Buster Clarke, and Buster is found dead in the bathroom of said house, her focus changes.

WHOLE LATTE MURDER by Lena Gregory is a great cozy mystery. Savannah and Gia are dating two detectives on the local police force, so their part in the investigation into the abduction and murder flows nicely and seems plausible. Like most good mystery books, though likely candidates are identified early on, the reader is left guessing who actually committed the crimes until it is revealed in the story near the end.

This is the fifth book in the All-Day Breakfast Cafe mystery series, but it can definitely be considered a stand-alone novel. I have not read the previous books in the series and I did not feel I was missing anything important to the plot of this story as a result.

I really enjoyed the way the author brings out the community coming together in this story. It is very heartwarming to see people of a community put aside their differences and work together when another member of the community is in need. That is a great benefit of living in a small town.

I also really enjoyed the focus on friendship in this book. Gia and Savannah have a very strong bond and are willing to be there for each other no matter the personal cost.

I recommend WHOLE LATTE MURDER without reservation for any reader who enjoys a good cozy mystery. As one would expect in a murder mystery, there is some violence portrayed, but it is not overly graphic.

Book Summary

Ex-New Yorker and local diner owner Gia Morelli is still getting used to the sweltering Florida sun. But this summer she’ll have to deal with a more dangerous kind of heat—when she’s hot on the trail of another murderer . . .

Summer in Boggy Creek has arrived, and Gia’s best friend, successful real estate agent Savannah, is getting hitched. Now she’s enlisted Gia’s sleuthing talents in a desperate search for the perfect wedding dress. But when Savannah mysteriously vanishes after showing a mansion to a bigwig client, Gia investigates the house Savannah was trying to sell. The first clue she finds is Savannah’s car in the driveway. Inside the house, they stumble on Savannah’s potential buyer—dead. Someone had apparently closed the deal—with a two by four full of nails to the client’s head. Soon afterward, a woman’s body is fished from the lake near the same house. The townsfolk are now sweating bullets over the murders, and the heat comes down on poor Gia to find her missing friend, and track down the killer . . .