Pies and Prejudice by Ellery Adams

 Ella Mae fell in love and left her hometown and her family to experience the fast paced life of the big city.  Six years later, her marriage has fallen apart and she is back in Havenwood, GA with her mother and her singular aunts. She is a near graduate of culinary school and a expert pie cook, so her aunts offer to get her set up in a pie shop in town.  She discovers, however, that whatever mood she has while baking seeps into her pies and affects the emotions of those who eat them. Meanwhile, her high school nemesis, Loralyn Gaynor, is making trouble for her. When Loralyn's fiancée turns up dead, Ella is framed for the murder. Ella Mae needs to clear her name by finding the real murderer, while dealing with an old flame, a new romantic interest, and her magical family.

Baking mysteries are a pretty big subset of cozy mysteries, but here we have a sub-subset of magical baking mysteries. Adams is an author I hadn't tried before, and I was worried this book would be too spicy (and I don't mean the cardamom or cinnamon kind of spice) but it wasn't.  There was a little language, but the only steam coming off the pages was from the pie oven.  I ended up enjoying the book. It was what a cozy mystery is supposed to be, light, fluffy and fun.  The mystery plot was decently contrived, and the characters were bigger than life. The magical pies made for some funny side scenes. I was a little disappointed that there were no recipes included in the audio version as there are in the Joanna Fluke books, but I still wouldn't be opposed to reading the next in the series. (304 p. 2012)