I went on a bit of a Christmas binge yesterday, and put a bunch of books on hold at the library for the season! 

If I don't like 'em, I can just return 'em. Libraries are awesome!

Finished! I have no intention of continuing on with this series. The coffee-making aspect should have been fascinating, and instead I felt like I was repeatedly being lectured at by someone who'd declare my usual coffee drinking habits to be uncultured garbage. The love triangle that I disliked was left at a point where it could (and probably would) rear its ugly head yet again in the next book, and the mystery aspect did nothing for me.

I don't really like these characters and am not particularly attached to the narrator, so I increased the narration speed.

There's a bit of a love triangle going on, and I dislike it. It involves Clare, who has been divorced for a number of years, and either her ex-husband or the cop who's helping her with the "accident" at her coffee house (the cops are no longer officially investigating, because there's no evidence of foul play).

The ex-husband: At some point before or after their marriage collapsed, he was addicted to cocaine. He's supposedly clean now, and trying to worm his way back into Clare's life. He's a charmer, and it doesn't hurt that his mother, who is also Clare's boss and coffee idol, is on his side.

The cop: He's married and has at least one child. He's been pretty closed-mouthed, but it seems like his marriage is having problems, and he seems potentially as interested in Clare as she is in him.

Of the two options, I prefer the ex-husband because he seems to have genuinely grown up a bit from however he was when he and Clare were together. Still, he is only the lesser of two evils. These options suck.

I imagine this particular part would be like a gut punch for anyone directly affected by 9/11. It's relatively brief, but there are a few mentions of deaths.

In my experience, cozy mysteries that have a food or crafting theme will often include recipes or projects. This one sort of does a similar thing, except it's incorporated directly into the text. Clare has just walked off to make some coffee for one of the detectives investigating the attack at her coffeehouse, and readers are now being treated to multi-step advice on how to store coffee. Earlier, it was instructions on how to make a perfect cup of coffee (with a coffee press or something? I admit that I wasn't paying a lot of attention).

I still feel like the attack isn't getting enough weight. It feels like coffee, the coffeehouse, and even the stupid 100-year-old plaque (supposedly the coffeehouse's only signage, and worth nearly $1000) are all more important than the attack.