Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Death by Coffee
    Death by Coffee
    Death by Coffee
    Audiobook7 hours

    Death by Coffee

    Written by Alex Erickson

    Narrated by Melissa Moran

    3/5

    ()

    Switch to ebook

    About this audiobook

    When Krissy Hancock and her best friend Vicki decide to open a bookstore cafe in their new town of Pine Hills, they decide to call it "Death by Coffee," after Krissy's father's most famous mystery novel. Little do they know how well the name fits . . .

    On their very first day of business, Brendon Lawyer huffily takes his coffee . . . to the grave. It seems he had a severe allergy to peanuts . . . but how could there have been nuts in his coffee? And who stole his emergency allergy medication?

    Fortunately, Krissy's love of puzzles and mysteries leads her not only to Officer Paul Dalton, but also to many of her new neighbors, who aren't terribly upset that the book is closed on Brendon. But one of them is a killer, and Krissy needs to read between the lies if she wants to save her new store-and live to see how this story ends . . .
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherTantor Media, Inc
    Release dateOct 17, 2017
    ISBN9781541487109

    More audiobooks from Alex Erickson

    Related to Death by Coffee

    Titles in the series (12)

    View More
    View More

    Related audiobooks

    Mystery For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Share a Coke With…

      Nov 24, 2018

      Share a Coke With…
      5 min read

    • Article

      The Duplex

      Jun 9, 2020

      I moved to Los Angeles to sing. When was this? August? June? I was twenty-nine, and those were shapeless months, when the days blended together and I refused to pull them apart. My landlord was unusually close to her adult son. His name was Jeffrey,

      21 min read

    • Article

      Supportive Husband

      Sep 12, 2023

      There were less intimate places available, so it was odd when a woman took the seat directly facing mine across the subway aisle. I looked up from my book and right back down: a couple of months before, we’d gone home together. She had a Southern acc

      22 min read

    • Article

      Meeting Eve Babitz

      Jan 7, 2019

      Meeting Eve Babitz
      7 min read

    • Article

      La Bohème

      Mar 1, 2022

      ON A SATURDAY or Sunday afternoon in the cold early months of 1988, I sat alone at a table for two in a Greenwich Village diner, twenty-four years old, hopelessly young, my notebook open in front of me. At the table next to mine were three people, al

      13 min read

    • Article

      The Idiots

      Feb 26, 2021

      The Idiots
      18 min read

    • Article

      ‘We Are Bridges’: Featured Nonfiction from Cassandra Lane

      Apr 20, 2021

      Lane's memoir, which won the 2020 Louise Meriwether First Book Prize, explores the author's ancestral history in order to give her future child a family history. The post ‘We Are Bridges’: Featured Nonfiction from Cassandra Lane appeared first on The

      8 min read

    • Article

      Penny

      Jul 2, 2020

      Penny
      6 min read

    • Article

      Uncontrollable, Irrelevant

      Dec 6, 2022

      My sister called me the other day. She wanted to let me know that I had once more been merciless and cruel in my relations with our parents. “They say there’s a lot of anger in you,” she said. “It makes them mad. It hurts their feelings. They think y

      14 min read

    • Article

      Q-tip Options

      Oct 10, 2023

      I am not a good person. Abby was at my door. My reaction when I saw her should have been more charitable. She was young and cute and needy, but all I wanted was a nice relaxing day at home. When the police questioned her, I should have let them take

      16 min read

    • Article

      Heave’s Whisky

      Feb 27, 2024

      Heave’s Whisky
      7 min read

    • Article

      A Temporary Arrangement

      Oct 2, 2023

      A Temporary Arrangement
      19 min read

    • Article

      The Man I Should Have Married

      Dec 29, 2019

      The Man I Should Have Married
      11 min read

    • Article

      Riccardo

      Jun 14, 2022

      My understanding of my family’s religion was that we didn’t have to go to church if we didn’t want to and that our belief in God was tenuous at best. I grasped the seventh principle, “the interconnected web of all existence,” and I understood the hum

      14 min read

    • Article

      I’ll Not Risk Myself

      Feb 10, 2024

      My phone reception is better outside the laundromat, so I spend most of my time waiting for laundry on the bench near the door. I don’t talk with my friends, but I surf the news. I like to know what’s going on. I don’t like people to know about me, t

      13 min read

    • Article

      Mysterious Moments

      Mar 22, 2019

      A few years ago, my husband and I had to go out of town for a funeral. We’d be gone for a night and into the next day, so we arranged for our neighbor Belinda to come by to feed our cat, Sweetpea, in the morning. When we returned home from our travel

      2 min read

    • Article

      Till We meet Again

      Aug 27, 2021

      Till We meet Again
      4 min read

    • Article

      Righteous

      Jan 22, 2019

      Righteous
      8 min read

    • Article

      Klara

      May 21, 2020

      Klara
      28 min read

    • Article

      The Sunrise Manor Routine

      Jun 1, 2019

      The Sunrise Manor Routine
      10 min read

    • Article

      The July War

      Sep 8, 2020

      In summer, our neighborhood quiets in phases. The quieting begins in May. Schools give their older kids, the seventeen- and eighteen-year-olds, a month off to prepare for the baccalaureate exams. Following a ritual as old as our parents, the students

      21 min read

    • Article

      You Exist Too Much

      Jun 5, 2020

      You Exist Too Much
      9 min read

    • Article

      Too Much Seinfeld

      Nov 30, 2017

      Too Much Seinfeld
      8 min read

    • Article

      Erotic, She Wrote

      Jun 10, 2021

      Erotic, She Wrote
      4 min read

    • Article

      Proverbs Of A Faceless Time

      Dec 1, 2023

      Proverbs Of A Faceless Time
      9 min read

    • Article

      Without A Trace

      May 26, 2022

      Without A Trace
      4 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Death by Coffee

    3/5

    61 ratings12 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 3/5
      I liked this book because it wasn't super intense and I felt like I was moving right along with the main character. Everything except how she took her coffee was logical and realistic which made the book a fun read. However good the storyline the book was quite dry in terms of character development and just didn't paint a good picture of things that seemed like they would become important later on.
    • 1/5
      Between the title name, the name of the series, and the cute fur face on the comfy chair surrounded by books on the cover how could I possibly resist reading this cozy? And that's about where my delight with the book started and ended.Set in the little town of Pine Hills, Ohio, Krissy Hancock and girlfriend Vicki Patterson have opened a combination coffee shop/bookstore named after Krissy's father's most famous mystery novel, "Death by Coffee." It seemed as though every aspect of the premise of the cozy would be an absolute delight but I finished this cozy only because I kept thinking, "Maybe, I'll read just one more chapter" because surely it would get better. My answer is a simple and emphatic, "NO!"I couldn't warm to the character of Krissy Hancock at all. Vicki must have had very sentimental remembrances of her long-time friend to think of inviting Krissy as her business partner. Whew! Vicki takes care of the bookstore and Krissy runs the coffee shop and thankfully there is a connecting doorway as Vicki is constantly covering for Krissy and is a very supportive friend. I couldn't believe it when Krissy decided she needed a "sick day" only a few days after they opened. I don't know any woman that would do that to another best friend and/or business partner. Krissy’s analysis as an amateur sleuth is simply not believable nor are her delusions of grandeur of being a town hero.It simply wasn't the blend of coffee shop/bookstore I was hoping to read. I'll skip this series.
    • 1/5
      Just no – not for me
      I think this is the first time in a long time that I have been reading a book and thought “Who wrote this?” and not in a good way. The main character is totally annoying and her love interest (a cop) comes off as a wet blanket that lets anyone walk over them. Her best friend Vicki is a much more interesting character and I wanted to hear more about how Krissy and her became friends.

      I couldn’t figure out why Krissy was so interested in the victim’s death. It wasn’t an interesting murder to me and I really didn’t care who killed the victim. Krissy was so intrusive in her investigation that I even I found her to be annoying. I can’t believe people told her anybody. I understand in cozies the main character is usually a nosy but Krissy was so blunt and rude in her questioning I didn’t like her at all.

      The book was a quick read though. I finished on a flight in one setting. I was given the next two books in the series and I am not sure I want to even to attempt to read them.
    • 4/5
      First in a series that I liked enough to keep reading it.
    • 3/5
      I liked this book because it wasn't super intense and I felt like I was moving right along with the main character. Everything except how she took her coffee was logical and realistic which made the book a fun read. However good the storyline the book was quite dry in terms of character development and just didn't paint a good picture of things that seemed like they would become important later on.
    • 2/5
      On opening day of Krissy and her partner's coffee shop, one of the customers dies after drinking a coffee from their store. I really didn't like Krissy -- she was pushy, rude and inserted herself into the police investigation all the while moaning on every other page that her business wouldn't survive this tragedy while leaving her partner to run the store. While on a date with the policeman who's investigating, she asks him to take her to the crime scene where the victim died managing to get them both arrested. Unbelievable!
    • 4/5
      I love coffee, I love books, and I love cats, so Death by Coffee, Bookstore Café Mysteries, with a cat on the cover, was bound to appeal to me. The story starts with new-in-town Krissy serving coffee at her newly-opened bookstore. Of course, there’s another café in this small town, so why would people come here? And there’s no promise that anyone will read or buy her books, even the ones written by her father. But Krissy and her friend are determined to make a go of this. Then one of their first customers is apparently poisoned while drinking from one of their cups.There’s something sadly convincing about the customer who says, “I’ve always wondered why we never had a bookstore in Pine Hills,” then doesn’t buy a book. But things might look up, and Krissy is ever hopeful. Her father was a writer, so she brings a tinge of fame. And if she hasn’t learned much about solving mysteries from him, she’ll just learn on the job.Told in first person, Death by Coffee creates a convincing picture of a somewhat disorganized, resolute sleuth, wounded by love but not too determined to avoid it in the future, hurt by the world but still eager to find good in it, and well-trained in the arts of asking awkward questions and trawling the internet. It’s a sweet cozy mystery, not too complex, nicely plotted, with a fine collection of side-characters adding color and promise for a series.Disclosure: I needed a book for a trip and this fit the bill.
    • 3/5
      Nice cozy. Krissy just may be too annoying and Vicki too perfect to take long term.
    • 5/5
      I received a free kindle copy of Death by Coffee by Alex Erickson, published by Kensington Books from NetGalley in exchange for a fair review.I gave this entertaining cozy mystery five stars. I enjoyed Krissy's attempts to solve what she believes to be a murder. Can she solve it before the killer gets to her?"'Who'd ever heard of a book club competition? Without having to ask, I knew Rita had been the one to come up with it. No one else would have thought of something so . . . odd.'"
    • 4/5
      Author Alex Erickson is off to a wonderful start with DEATH BY COFFEE. I had been looking forward to reading this first book in the new Bookstore Café Mystery series. I saw the cover online months ago and couldn’t wait for it to be released. It was worth the wait and I was not disappointed! The setting of the connecting bookstore and café was delightful. I often wish I had a place like this locally. The owners of this wonderful shop, DEATH BY COFFEE (Same name as the book), Krissy Hancock and her best friend Vicki Peterson, are a fun pair. Their personalities play well off each other. I can’t wait to learn more about them in future books. The murder in the book happens almost right away. Normally I prefer it to take place later in the story, but I didn’t like the victim anyway, so I was okay with it. ;-) The story and the mystery of who the killer was flowed at a great pace. The reveal was a surprise to me. I love when I don’t see it coming. DEATH BY COFFEE gets added to my list of books I couldn’t put down! Mr. Erickson has insured that I will be adding this new series to me must read list. Check out the back of the book for a sneak peek of Book 2 in the Bookstore Café series, DEATH BY TEA, coming in December of 2015. This year…yay!
    • 2/5
      Krissy and her best friend Vicki have just opened a bookstore/cafe in the small town of Pine Hills. On their first day of business (which definitely isn't bustling, by the way) a customer orders a cup of coffee, takes it to go and dies a short time later after he returns to his place of business.Since it is discovered that the victim had a severe peanut allergy, and there was peanut dust in the coffee, Krissy, the daughter of a famous mystery writer, is determined to find out how the dust got there...because apparently the police can't figure it out.What we have here is the beginning of a new series, and I wish I could give it a better review. The plot line is interesting, and the characters could be, if there were any character development at all. We know that Vicki is drop dead gorgeous, but we know very little about the protagonist, Krissy. Is her hair dark or light? Short or long? She says 'she's not fat or anything,' but does she have a little weight or is it even noticeable? I would have liked to have known more about her; as it was, I couldn't get a description in my head, per se. We know that Vicki is gorgeous, but for some strange reason, there isn't a single man in town who is interested in seeing her. At least none who read books or drink coffee, from what I gather.Since both Krissy and Vicki have opened the bookstore that morning, and don't know anyone in town, you would think they would be trying to drum up business for their shop. But they sit around and hope people would come in. So when the man, Brendon Lawyer, dies, Krissy does the only natural thing she can do - she walks right up to people and asks them if they had any reason to kill him...whaaat? If a complete stranger (and I assume she is, because no one knows who she is) walked up to me and asked me that, I'd first look at them like they were insane, and then just turn and walk away. But what do these people do? They answer her. And then try and throw her out. Repeatedly.Plus, the two main characters have cats, but both cats hate people and are mean. Mean as in attacking. Why? I have cats, and they don't attack anyone. That's something you train against when they're still kittens. Cats are just as loyal as dogs, some even more so. If you give them love and attention, they're all yours. Trust me. I have cats that grab at me as I go down the staircase, or jump at me from behind the blinds - without using their claws. I've never had one jump under one of my dresses while I was wearing it.Then there's Paul the cop. (Sigh.) He's hunky, of course. But not very bright. Paul's mother practically sets Krissy and him up on a date. Afterward, they go to the crime scene because somehow Krissy has convinced him she wants to see it and investigate. When they get caught, Paul's mother, the chief of police, hints that they should sleep together. Creepy, right? Then there's the fact that at times Krissy talks like a man. Women don't call toilets "thrones." We also are not so crude (I hope) as to say a man 'was taking a leak.' We might say we have to go to the bathroom, but we never share the information that we actually are.When the murderer is revealed, it comes as no surprise. The reason behind it made sense, but we couldn't even feel sorry for the murderer at the end. I would really have liked to have given this book a higher rating, as I enjoy cozies completely; but there just wasn't enough of feeling invested in the book to do so. I hope that this, being the first book in the series, improves with the next one.
    • 3/5
      Death by Coffee by Alex Erickson is the first book in the new Bookstore Café Mystery series. Krissy Hancock has moved to Pine Hills to start a book store/coffee shop with her best friend, Vicki Patterson. They received the start-up money for their business from Krissy’s father, James Hancock. James Hancock is a retired mystery writer. Their new store is named Death by Coffee after James Hancock’s first book (despite Krissy’s many objections). On their opening day Brendon Lawyer comes in for a cup of coffee. He leaves after getting a call and returns to his insurance office across the street. Soon the police and an ambulance arrive across the street. When Officer Paul Dalton comes in Death by Coffee, he tells Krissy that Brendon is dead. Traces of peanut were found in his coffee. Brendon had a peanut allergy and died from anaphylactic shock. Brendon usually has an EpiPen in his briefcase, but there was no EpiPen in there today (sounds like he had a severe allergy to peanuts).Krissy loves mysteries and puzzles. She has gotten into trouble in the past for sticking her nose into situations that she shouldn’t, but Krissy keeps doing it anyway. She sets out to find out who killed Brendon Lawyer despite Vicki’s (and the police’s) pleas. Krissy is not subtle about her questioning. She just barges in and asks her questions (and she wonders why the new business is suffering). Vicki is a good partner. She keeps the business running while Krissy is out investigating. Chief Dalton likes Krissy and thinks she is perfect for her son (Officer Paul Dalton). Krissy still has not unpacked anything in her house, but she has a date! Who killed Brendon Lawyer and how did they do it?I did not learn much about Vicki in the book. I know she went to high school and college with Krissy, she does not like acting (which is what her parents want her to do), and she wanted to live in a small town (and get away from her parents). I actually learned more about Krissy’s cat, Misfit (we get to hear a little too much about the cat). There is also a cat in Death by Coffee (the shop). Its name is Trouble and trouble is what it causes in the store.I was really looking forward to Death by Coffee. It sounded like a good book, but I was very disappointed. The mystery was easy to solve if you follow the clues. There is a lot of repeating of information throughout the book (like how Krissy puts a cookie in the bottom of her coffee cup before putting in the coffee). There are many rambling paragraphs where Krissy is “thinking” about the case. Krissy tends to check out of reality when she is trying to solve a puzzle. Those ramblings also contain her thoughts on the hunky Paul Dalton. I give Death by Coffee 3 out of 5. This is just the first book of the series and a lot of series get better as they progress. We will have to wait and see. I received a complimentary copy of Death by Coffee from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. The review and opinions expressed are strictly my own.