Reviewed by Jeanne
Vera Wong is the proprietor of the somewhat misleadingly named
Vera Wang’s World Famous Teahouse. (Yes, it’s Wang, because it can’t hurt to have her tea house associated with a
famous person, right?) With customers few and far between, Vera can spend her
time trying to “help” her only child, Tilbert, by calling him at 5 am to be
sure he is not being lazy, reminding him to look for a girlfriend, and
imparting valuable medical advice such as going to bed past 9 pm leads to
prostate cancer. Oddly, Tilly—as she insists on calling him—doesn’t seem to be
properly grateful for her parental participation in his life. It’s most discouraging, except that Vera is
not one to be discouraged.
Then one morning she comes downstairs to the tea shop to find
a dead man.
Vera is thrilled.
She has watched “Law and Order” and “CSI” and she knows she is
going to be a great help to the investigation.
Of course, she preserves the crime scene almost as it was, and eagerly awaits the arrival of the police.
She is deeply disappointed in the official response. They are
very unappreciative of her efforts, refuse to drink the tea she has prepared,
and don’t seem to be taking her seriously.
She decides that it’s up to her to solve this mystery and show the
police the error of their ways.
This book had rave reviews and is up for some mystery awards,
so it was definitely already on my radar.
I had read other books by Jesse Q. Sutanto and knew they were funny, but
this one knocked it out of the ballpark. It is a wonderful mix of humor, mystery,
romance, and family. We get the story not
only from Vera’s point of view, but also from some of Vera’s suspects, all of
whom are left dazed with the force of Vera’s personality. I was anxious to find out how it all turned
out, not just to solve the murder but to find out what happens to all the
characters. I also wanted to track
people down and make them listen to me read passages from the book.
This is definitely going to be one of my “Best of” lists for
2023.
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