Mulch Ado About Murder by Edith Maxwell

We’ve already shown you the perfect drink pairing to go with Mulch Ado About Murder, but now Kerry Hammond is here to give us her review of the book.

Mulch Ado About Murder is the fifth book in the Local Foods Mystery series written by Edith Maxwell, featuring Cam Flaherty, an organic farmer in Westbury, Massachusetts. This is my first in the series, so I wondered how I would do if I jumped in at book five. The verdict is that I did just fine and had a great time in the process.

Cam Flaherty runs a farm she inherited from her uncle in the small New England town of Westbury. Her life is rather complete; she is passionate about farming and even has a love interest with Homicide Detective Pete Pappas. Her parents are visiting, which causes her a little bit of distress. Her mother is an extremely cerebral and emotionally distant professor; making her hard to get close to. Her father, also a professor, is a more mild-mannered man who seems to have taken to farming life.

In addition, there is quite a hubbub going on in town as the local hydroponics farmer, Nicole Kingsbury, is getting picketed for her growing techniques because she dares to call them “organic.” The traditional growers—who believe in the old school plants in soil idea versus a more modern approach to farming—are up in arms over Nicole’s process. Cam seems to be somewhere in the middle and has even provided seedlings to the hydroponic farmer. When she takes over her latest batch and finds Nicole’s dead body, she becomes mixed up in the murder investigation. To make matters worse, her Mom seems to have known the victim and might even be the last person to have seen her alive.

I enjoyed following Cam through her amateur investigation and finding out the secrets from her parents’ past. I read books to live vicariously through the characters and I can honestly say that I’ve never lived vicariously through an organic farmer. Cam and her many volunteer farmers are fun characters and the mystery had me guessing until the end. It was a fun read!