The Dead Letter Recipe
Warm
A dead-letter package. A legendary jam cake. A secret recipe someone would rather keep buried.
When a battered parcel arrives at the Cedar Springs post office addressed to a woman dead for twenty years, postmaster Tessa Quill expects a simple clerical mystery. Instead, she finds a handwritten recipe for Blackberry Jam Cake, a tarnished brass key, and a note that reads: Forgive me before the last slice is served.
The package belongs to Dovie Bell, the long-departed owner of the Blue Willow Supper Club — a woman Cedar Springs remembers as a recipe thief, a scandal-maker, and perhaps something worse.
But Tessa’s friend Eula Mae remembers Dovie differently. To her, Dovie was a gifted cook with a generous heart and a kitchen full of secrets worth protecting.
As Tessa follows a trail of recipe cards, supper club ledgers, old newspaper clippings, and one very opinionated ginger cat, she uncovers a truth sweeter and more dangerous than anyone expected. Dovie’s restaurant was more than a place to eat. It was a refuge.
And someone in Cedar Springs is still willing to poison the past before the truth can be served.
Perfect for fans of warm small-town mysteries, culinary secrets, amateur sleuths, and cozy cats with excellent instincts.
