Ever wondered what would happen if you took contestants of your favorite reality show and thrust them into a mystery? Baking show turned whodunnit, I enjoyed this book! I loved the winks to The Great British Baking Show, especially ersatz Prue Lieth and Paul Hollywood, and the mysteries were fun to explore (if not necessarily difficult to figure out).
The actors were all great and really helped me to keep track of the characters while listening. I had heard some criticism that the characters were a bit one-dimensional, and while I don’t necessarily disagree, for me that just added to their “reality show” personas. We almost never get the full picture of someone on television, and it felt like each of these characters fit neatly into their assigned competition show spot. It made it all the more intriguing to see what The Overconfident One, The Ingenue, The Elder, The Beginner, etc. would do when faced with something more intense than what glaze to use.
There are several smaller mysteries and one very large one, and even though none of them are particularly hard to figure out, the characters made each one a fun ride.