Fry Another Day, by J.J. Cook

Synopsis: From the national bestselling author of the Sweet Pepper Fire Brigade Mysteries comes the second in a new series featuring Zoe Chase, a Southern food truck chef who serves justice on the side.
 
With a few loyal friends in tow—including her handsome attorney, Miguel, and her cat, Crème Brûlée—Zoe drives the Biscuit Bowl to Charlotte, North Carolina, to enter a nationally televised food truck race. The contest features challenges across the Southeast, and with a fifty-thousand-dollar grand prize, competition isn’t just fierce—it’s killer.
 
As everyone gears up for the first challenge, another food trucker from Zoe’s hometown is found dead. The race rolls on, but when the body count rises, police begin to suspect Miguel. Now Zoe must race to catch the killer before her attorney needs an attorney.

Thoughts: This time around, the Biscuit Bowl gang are part of a nationally televised food truck race. When one of the other food truck drivers wind up dead, Zoe goes into detective mode. As the body count rises, Zoe is anxious to find the killer before she is next, and before Miguel is branded as the killer.

This is another great entry for this series, and a very quick read. It grabs your attention very early on, and keeps it to the very end. Once again, the identity of the killer wasn't easily determined, which is one of the things I like about cozy mysteries. 

**I received a copy of this book from the author in return for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are entirely my own.**

My rating: Four stars

Death On Eat Street, by J.J. Cook

Synopsis: Zoe Chase always wanted to own her own restaurant—but first, she’ll have to serve up a heaping helping of meals on wheels, with a side of mystery… 

When she’s once again passed over for a promotion at work, Zoe decides to take the big leap and go for her dream. She quits, gives up her fancy digs, and buys a fixer-upper diner in a shady part of town. To keep above water during the renovation, she buys a used food truck to serve the downtown and waterfront of Mobile, Alabama.

Zoe starts to dish out classic Southern food—but her specialty is her deep-fried biscuit bowls that blow traditional bread bowls away.

After a promising start, things start to go downhill faster than a food truck without brakes. First, someone tries to rob the cash register. Next, Zoe is threatened by the owner of a competing food truck for taking their spot. And when the owner ends up dead inside Zoe’s rolling restaurant, Zoe and her sole employee, Ollie, find themselves hopping out of the frying pan into the fryer. They need to find the real killer, before both of them get burned.

Thoughts: A great cozy mystery, with a new (at least to me) type of setting---a food truck! Zoe buys a rundown diner, and starts a food truck to raise money to renovate it. Imagine her shock when another food truck driver shows up in her truck---dead! After being taken in for questioning, and then released when someone else is arrested, Zoe decides to start investigating. On top of that, her parents and former boyfriend are trying to talk her into giving up her "craziness" and go back to her old life. Constant action and great dialogue keep the story moving at a rapid pace. It took me quite a while to solve the mystery, which is just how I like it. Now I'm off to read the next book in the series, Fry Another Day!

**I received a copy of this book from the author in return for a honest review. All thoughts and opinions are entirely my own.**

My rating: Four stars

Gator Bowl (A Biscuit Bowl Food Truck Novella), by J.J. Cook

Synopsis: From the national bestselling author of the Sweet Pepper Fire Brigade Mysteries comes a tasty prequel novella to J.J. Cook’s new series featuring Zoe Chase, a Southern food truck chef who serves justice on the side.
After quitting her job, the first thing Zoe Chase has to do is to drive out to the swamp to see her Uncle Saul. He still has the old Airstream trailer he once used for his own restaurant many years before, and Zoe is sure she can convince him to let her make a food truck out of it.
After making the perilous journey from Mobile, Alabama into the backcountry, Zoe finds her uncle embroiled in a cook-off with his neighbor—with the life of Saul’s albino alligator, Alabaster, in the balance. Once again, the gator has eaten chickens that didn’t belong to her. So Saul and his neighbor will each prepare a meal for a church social, and if Saul wins, the gator lives.
Now it’s up to Zoe to prove herself in the kitchen and come up with something no one has seen before—the biscuit bowl!

Thoughts: This is a prequel to the Biscuit Bowl series, which I have not yet started to read. If this novella is any indication, however, I am going to enjoy the entire series. Zoe and her "supporting cast" are a great group of people, and I love the personality of Zoe's cat, Creme Brulee. Her Uncle Saul's albino alligator, Alabaster, is fun to read about as well. I hope that we get to read more about Saul, Alabaster and Bonnie in the future. And I hope Ollie will continue to hang around with Zoe, as well...he seems like the kind of friend you can always use in your corner.

Looking forward to reading the two full length stories in this series in the very near future.

**I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are entirely my own.** 

My rating: Four stars