I've read nearly every book in Laura Childs' Tea Shop Mysteries series so I was interested to try her other series about scrapbooking. Normally I am not a scrapbooker, but I like books about shop owners, and their regulars and that type of thing, so I was sure I'd enjoy more of Laura Childs' writing.
I wasn't too disappointed. The Tea Shop books take place in Charleston, SC and there is a lot of that city and its high society lifestyle outlined in each book. The Scrapbooking series takes place in another great Southern city, New Orleans. The heroine is Carmela, a woman who is currently separated from her husband who is part of one of the city's "old money" families. Her husband, Shamus, has left her and his position at the family bank to find himself and live in the bayou taking photographs of nature. Carmela isn't happy about this, but she musters on, running her scrapbooking shop.
The mystery emerges during one of the Mardi Gras parades, when a notable member of the Pluvius krewe dies on one of the floats. He was poisoned, and the cops are interested in Shamus as a suspect. Even though she's annoyed at him for dumping her for his camera, Carmela is not ready to believe Shamus is a murderer, so she starts digging into the murder to clear his name.
The relationship between Shamus and Carmela isn't resolved, although it is clear that he still cares about her and she loves him. I hope that the author doesn't drag this out forever in the series!
Overall, the mystery was kind of silly, I guessed the murder motive in the first chapter after the guy was killed, but I liked the details about the city and the colorful New Orleans characters in the book.
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