Review: Lack of depth to characters &  the poor editing,
Rating: 2 out of 5
Date: 11 16, 2013
I was intrigued – who wouldn’t be for a chocolate-motivated murder mystery?  And after the first chapter where too many characters are introduced, thus muddying the playing field rather than presenting people as more than placeholders, the story did start to improve in quality and twists.Maxine’s new venture, Au Chocolat is a lovely little shop, and all looks to be successful until a customer dies and her chocolates are thought to be the cause.  Patrick, her on-again-off-again detective boyfriend is on the case, as is Maxine.Unfortunately the lack of depth to characters, the poor editing, and the fact that the most distinctive feature that delineated characters were their names were overwhelming issues that distracted from the story and did not allow for an easy read or empathy with Maxine, who should have been very easy to relate to.  There are nuggets of brilliance that only needed the sugar coating pulled away, too many characters without distinction only served to decrease my interest in the ‘who did it’ than give me that AHA moment when the murderer was revealed.To the author’s credit – there are some wonderfully good moments, some great description and some truly luscious recipes shared that all kept me reading.I purchased a copy of the title for my own library. I was not compensated for this review: all conclusions are my own responsibility.