Monday Musings - Literary Libations - Tea Shop Mysteries - The Jasmine Moon Murder

This fifth book in the Tea Shop Mysteries was a little different in that the person murdered was a relative of one of the main characters. Shockingly he was killed during a "Ghost Crawl" which was an evening historical tour through Jasmine Cemetary. As is often the case, Theodosia and her Indigo Tea Shop crew were catering the refreshments so were on hand to start collecting clues right away.

What I liked:

Descriptions of different china tea pots and their makers inspired me to dig a little further into some of them and that was interesting to me. I also like the tea party ideas in the backs of the books though I have no occasion right now to use them. Maybe someday soon. This book also included ideas on reusing tea bags, a subject near and dear to my old-time missionary heart. (It used to be a joke that people would save up their used tea bags and send them to the missionaries. Once we actually recieved such a package, but it turned out to be a prank from other missionaries. 😄)

The tea:

I didn't buy a new tea for this book because I had a Jasmine Tea Blend from Simpson and Vail and to tell the truth, I don't care for it. It's too flowery for me. More power to those who do like a flowery tea. I did make some of it again, just to give it another fair chance (and to take the photo), but it's still not to my liking. The label on the tin sure is pretty, though.

What I could have lived without:

I don't know if I just didn't notice it before or if Laura Childs just made a change, but she seems to have forgotten how to consistently form complete sentences. I know it's a literary device to do things like "But the house was big. Cavernous, in fact. And, truth be told, awfully lonely." It creates emphasis and stresses a point, but using said device too often is overkill, annoying, and makes one wonder about the skill of the writer. Often a dash can separate phrases without having to have a non-sentance.

The recipes:

Again, I skipped the recipes because of heat, lack of time, and need to cut calories, but one of these days I'm going to use some of them. Because she incudes a scone recipe in just about every book, I think it would be fun to make and sample each recipe at some point - maybe have a group over and have a scone buffet, or maybe try a different scone recipe every Sunday afternoon for several weeks...

I have a part-time job for the summer cleaning high-end rentals on lakeside properties so my reading time is less than usual, which wasn't a whole lot to start with, but I'm going to keep plugging a long at the pace I can. Join me if you like.