Cooking For Ghosts Book One : The Secret Spice Cafe by Patricia V Davis

Cooking for Ghosts Book One : The Secret Spice Cafe is a first for me dear readers !!

Why ?? Well I started this blog back in April with the intention of just seeing how it went and giving my views on books that I read along with recommendations on when and where to read them on your holidays so that a small number of people may read my blog and then possibly some of the books I reviewed. Little did I know that within four months of starting it, over 75,000 of you would read my blog, give me positive feedback on social media and actually go on to read many of the books I’ve recommended on your holidays and then come back and thank me. On the back of this success I actually got contacted after my cruise on QM2 this summer by an author (Patricia V Davis) and her publisher asking me if I would be interested in reviewing her books as they were set on the original Queen Mary. Like many of you, I love a good book generally, but to also have it set on board a ship made it even more appealing to me and no doubt also  to my blog readers (ie you !). So here is my very first blog of a book that I’ve actually been asked to review :

Four ladies all from very different back grounds and with secrets to hide are brought together on line due to their passion for food. Overtime they become good friends and when one of them comes up with the opportunity to open and run a restaurant using their multiple talents on board the famous liner, Queen Mary, which is moored at Long Beach, California, none of them can refuse.

Cynthia puts up the money to run the business, Jane provides her acumen as a professor, her sister in law Angela the bakery skills and Rohini the Indian Spices as they all meet at Long Beach to start to put their dream business together. They bring in Spanaird, Cris as head chef knowing that he has a history of his own having killed the man who raped and murdered his sister before getting away with it and then finally there is Sarita, Cynthia’s growing up fast teenage daughter. The Queen Mary herself is a character of her own, with nearly 70 years of history and plenty of stories that are both fact and fiction, having been both a passenger liner to the rich and famous and a troop carrier in World War II. In fact, the Queen Mary steals the show as one of the worlds most haunted places to visit.

As the four ladies embark on their business venture together, sparks fly in more ways than one, with love, marriage, arguments, murder, death and witchcraft all featuring along with ghosts from the Queen Mary’s past. We also learn about the past of each of the ladies, as in different ways their pasts come back to haunt them, making them question their past actions and alter their lives for the future.

The story takes us through their opening few months of working and living on board, introduces us to some of the new colleagues/friends they make on board and how they learn that they all can see ghosts and how one in particular has a very special talent in relation to the super natural.

Secret Spice Cafe has some great ingredients to it that make it a perfect read for when you are cruising, especially if you are crossing the Atlantic or travelling over Halloween. Some of the facts that Patricia Davis includes in the storyline about the Queen Mary and her history are true and at times I found myself stopping my reading to google a fact to see if it really was true or not.

This is at times a fun read whilst also having a serious under current to it too with a super natural flavour and if you read it in the spirit that it’s meant then you will really enjoy it. I personally would rate ‘Cooking For Ghosts -The Secret Spice Cafe’ a good 8 out of ten and yes, it should definitely go on your cruising shortlist reads and is available on kindle and paperback.

I’ve got book 2 of the trilogy, ‘Spells and Oregano’ to read and will do soon so definitely keep an eye out for that review to come up shortly.

If you want to find out more about the author, Patricia V Davis, please feel free to click on the
following link to Patricia’s web page: http://patriciavdavis.com/books/secret_spice_cafe_book_series

Happy Reading

Canberralover