



Guilt and Ginataan
-
- £7.99
Publisher Description
Autumn is in full swing for the town of Shady Palms—the perfect time for warm drinks, cozy cardigans, and…dead bodies?
The annual Shady Palms Corn Festival is one of the town’s biggest moneymakers, drawing crowds from all over the Midwest looking to partake in delicious treats, local crafts, and of course, the second largest corn maze in Illinois. Lila Macapagal and her Brew-ha Cafe crew, Adeena Awan and Elena Torres, are all too happy to participate in the event and even make a little wager on who can make it through the corn maze the fastest—but their fun is suddenly cut short when a dead body is found in the middle of the maze…and an unconscious Adeena lies next to it, clutching a bloody knife.
The body is discovered to be a local politician’s wife, and all signs—murder weapon included—point to Adeena as the culprit. But Lila knows her best friend couldn’t have done this, so she and her crew put on their sleuthing caps yet again to find the killer who framed Adeena and show them what happens when they mess with a Brew-ha…
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Café owner Lila Macapagal attempts to clear her best friend and business partner's name in Manansala's diverting fifth cozy set in Shady Pines, Ill. (after Murder and Mamon). The town's annual harvest festival takes a chilling turn when Yvonne Reyes, wife of the mayor of nearby Shelbyville, winds up dead in the corn maze. Suspect number one is Lila's bestie, Adeena Awan, who wakes up next to Yvonne's corpse with a bloody knife and a case of amnesia. Lila, convinced of Adeena's innocence, investigates alongside her boyfriend, hunky dentist Dr. Jae Park, and Jae's older brother, a former cop. The trio's chief suspects include the mayor's jealous assistant, a crooked state politician, and even the mayor herself. While the mystery plot is a bit paint-by-numbers, Manansala brightens the proceedings with mouthwatering Filipino recipes and winsome check-ins with Lila's extended network of aunts, grandmothers, and female mentors. It's a good bet for fireside reading on a fall night.