Review: "The Pie & Mash Detective Agency," J.D. Brinkworth

The final project for Jane and Simon's "Private Investigation Level One" class is a daunting one. A woman called Nellie Thorne has gone missing. In 1971. In 1997. And in 2025. Oh, and a few times in between.

It can’t possibly be the same Nellie. Is it coincidence? Is Nellie a ghost? Is it part of some kind of weird game?

Jane Pine and Simon Mash must solve the mystery to pass the class and go pro. They’ve already got the name of their aspirational enterprise picked out: “The Pie and Mash Detective Agency.”

Their instructor, Gavin Smith, smiles inwardly as he gives them their assignment. While other students are dealing with fabricated cases, he investigated the actual 1997 Nellie Thorne disappearance. He was never able to solve it, and it haunts him. In more ways than one—his sleuthing got him involved with some bad guys, which resulted in lasting physical injuries.

Yet this doesn’t stop him from sending out two hapless millennials into what could be a world of danger.

They do mean well. They do try. But they really don’t know what they’re doing.

Jane is a small, unemployed programmer who is very keen to become a detective. Her tag on Simon’s phone is “Jane (Girlfriend).” 

Simon is tall, good-looking and goofy. On Jane’s phone, he appears as “World’s Sexiest Man.” He seems to organize team-building events for corporate types. He has a wealthy mother named Penny who has a busier (also crazier) social life than Jane and Simon.

Simon likes the fun bits of detecting, like buying orange tartan trench coats for the pair. He’s already come up with a catchphrase for the agency: “Smash!”

Not surprisingly, Jane is the one who gets things done. Eventually.

The two start by meeting Dev Hooper, boyfriend of the latest missing Nellie. The three of them decide that maybe some paranormal activity might be involved, so they call in a ghost hunter for a nighttime rendezvous in some nearby woods. When Simon discovers a pregnancy test wand jammed in Dev’s toilet, they’re able to put that theory to rest. Clearly, Nellie is still very much alive.

Jane does research in the local library, with the help (of a sort) from the world’s worst librarian, Linda. Really, she makes the tots in story time cry. Jane also connects with Bernard Parker, a policeman who worked on the case.

At the same time, Gavin feels compelled to get involved (without Jane and Simon knowing) and he gets back in touch with Parker, whom he knew back in the day.

Although the case seemed confounding at first, I suddenly had an insight into the truth about the case. Which was a good thing, because I was afraid the story might veer off into the woo-hoo, and I wouldn’t have liked that. No worries. It turns out that I was headed in the right direction, but the real story of Nellie Thorne was more surprising—and satisfying—than I was imagining.

Jane, Simon and Gavin crack the case in a wild and crazy denouement. Despite themselves. A sequel to this fun and funny cozy mystery seems to be promised in an intriguing letter that appears on the last page of the book.

Smash!

From Here: Observing the Natural World

 -------------------- Back to the Bin --------------------

Something happens when Paul announces, "We're ready to start composting again."

The world shifts. Soon I will be gardening and shopping at farmers’ markets and farm stands. I’ll be cooking with local and seasonal foods. I’ll be picking flowers from my beds.  

And when I find a moment, I’ll be sitting on the porch, reading.

I will be in my happy season.

We take our fruit and vegetable scraps and store them in a metal bucket designed for that purpose. When it’s full, we bring it out to the wooden bins Paul built years ago. They don’t get full sun, so they don’t make for an optimal compost-producing operation, but they do provide enough product to keep most of our beds nourished.

Composting isn’t just about the end result, though that is important. If you want to grow organically, which we have always done, there’s nothing better to enrich your soil than your own rotted lemon peels and potato parings.

Meanwhile, food waste is a real problem. It’s the single largest type of material in U.S. landfills. When it rots there, it produces methane, which is a greenhouse gas.

When I compost, I do feel I’m doing the right thing, environmentally speaking. But I also enjoy the process. Turning food waste into fertilizer makes me feel a bit like a magician. And I prefer, for hygienic reasons, to bring food scraps outside rather than throwing them in the kitchen trash container.

When I was growing up, my parents had a metal container with a lid buried in the yard. My mother would put the “swill,” as she called it, into it. Somebody—I’m not sure I ever saw him—would come by and take it away, to feed it to pigs.

It pleases me to think that my parents, in this way, were more ecologically correct than me.

Composting is easy. Save your scraps. Add garden debris and fallen leaves to your bins. Mix it up and let it sit. Soon you will have a rich, crumbly mixture that will make your plants grow tall and strong without chemical additives.

In fact, the scraps already start percolating while they’re still in the house. When I pick up the container to add more swill, I can feel the heat.

It’s exciting, but I don’t take a deep breath, for obvious reasons. I do smile. I know that from a brown banana peel, a scooped-out grapefruit, a few moldy peas, my happiness will grow.

_______ 

 

 I welcome email at lizzie621@icloud.com

From Here: Observing the Natural World

-------------------- Splish-Splash—It’s Spring! --------------------

A robin flapped its wings in the birdbath. She stuck her head into the water, splashed some more. Flapped those wings around. Splish-splash!

It was March 30th, and I had seen a few robins around town. But this was the first one to appear in our yard. The robin, of course, is a harbinger of spring. But a robin taking a bath—well, that is reason to rejoice.

We provide water for our backyard critters all year round. In the winter, Paul is in charge of setting up “The Bluebird Cafe,” a heated birdbath. Sparrows and chickadees enjoy drinking from it regularly, along with the squirrels. Sometimes our resident cardinals and blue jays also pop in.

They drink, sometimes heartily. But they never, ever bathe.

It’s a different story in the warm weather. We have three warm-weather baths in the backyard: a standard pedestal model, a shallow leaf-shaped receptacle that lies on the ground, and the Zen birdbath.

The latter is a squat square block of concrete and the birds love it. It only stands about a foot off the ground, but sometimes in midsummer there’s a line waiting to get in. The birds splash around, then hop on the rim and preen. They can be quite vigorous. If no one swoops in to take their spot, they may head back in for a second round.

The robin had the place to herself. She took her time, and made sure she was squeaky clean.

It was a pleasant day for March. The sun was out. But it was still March, gray and brown with a bite to the breeze. The calendar said spring had arrived, but it didn’t feel like it.

Until I saw that robin. That robin, taking a bath.

_______ 

 

 I welcome email at lizzie621@icloud.com

Review: "Murder on Charity Lane," Jo Nichols

Golda Barkofsky, 82, the sharp-eyed fairy godmother who owns the Marigold Cottages in Santa Barbara, California, is back. So are her energetic and eclectic tenants.

Murder is not far behind.

In The Marigold Cottages Murder Collective, the tenants of the quaint bungalow court reluctantly teamed up to solve a case. Now they’re a solid band of crime-fighting buddies—with, to put it euphemistically, a flexible moral compass.

They solve cases their way.

It all starts off so innocently. Mrs. B brings CJ into the group, in hopes that she’ll hit it off with tenant Ocean, an artist and mother to Riley and Miles. CJ helps Mrs. B fasten her bra after water aerobics class at the Y. Now there’s an endorsement! CJ works as an assistant to the fabulously wealthy Frank DeYoung. The elderly man lives with his wife Karina in an amazing house on Charity Lane in swanky Hope Ranch.

Learning this, Mrs. B has another idea. She gets CJ to invite tenants Sophie, recently promoted to development director at the New Vic Theatre, and Nicholas, a city planner (they’re now a couple and living together) to a party at the DeYoungs' house. Maybe Sophie can rustle up some donations.

Instead, Sophie and Nicholas witness a horrible event. Frank DeYoung is killed when he falls down the stairs. And his wife claims CJ pushed him.

CJ, who has just moved into Sophie’s old cottage.

Detective Sergeant Vernon Enible is not amused that the Murder Collective is involved with another possible murder. But he can’t stop them. The whole gang is involved. 

Lily-Ann brings her organizational skills (and knowledge of the wealthy, and exquisite fashion sense). Anthony contributes his physical strength and knowledge of the seedier side of life (he’s an ex-con).

Hamilton, who serves kombucha at Collective meetings and never leaves the house except for medical appointments, extracts information from a police officer through favors on the online fantasy game Realm of Rangers, which they both play.

The stakes soar when Mrs. B uses the Marigold as collateral to get CJ out of jail. Then CJ disappears. Then there’s a second murder…

In between the non-stop action, the members of the Collective try to communicate via group chat (Anthony can’t type, which leads to amusing spell-check corrections) and take risks even they know they shouldn’t be taking.

In the end, they tie up all the loose ends in their own inimitable style. Detective Enible is happy to take the win.

I enjoyed the humor in this book, the sparkling “SoCal” setting, and the warmth of the relationships among the characters. The story is told in alternating viewpoints by various characters, who are all so different, but all dedicated to their shared vision of justice. They also truly care about each other.

Spoiler alert: Many mentions are made to the events in The Marigold Cottages Murder Collective. That’s necessary because the characters are still grappling, to varying degrees, with how they handled the situations in the first book.

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I received an advance e-copy of Murder on Charity Lane from NetGalley. It will be published on August 18, 2026.