The Recipe Cops by Keith Weaver

by Keith Weaver

It's been a rocky couple of weeks for Jim Sanford. He's had to deal with two life-changing deaths - first his mother, and then the man who combined father figure and best friend since his boyhood. Sanford travels back to his hometown, Stanley Falls, deep in rural Ontario to deal with his friend's estate. But what he finds does not seem normal. He uncovers a side of his friend that is new and unknown. From beyond the grave he is led to a coded message, numbered envelopes, and a dead body. His ex-wife, back in Toronto, is attacked and killed. Worst of all, his own identity comes into question. He no longer understands who he is. A thin thread, offering a faint hope to resolve the mystery, pulls him to Europe, leading Sanford and his young daughter to new connections and a dangerous confrontation.

Paperback

About the author

Born and raised in the Kawartha Lakes region of south-central Ontario. I attended the University of Toronto (1966-1971) and then things began to happen.
During the years 1971-1974 I lived in London (the real London, that is) where my work history reflected the life of a footloose youth. The best thing I did during that time was to be married.
The years 1975 to 2012 were spent in my nuclear phase, during which time I worked for two years as an editor at the United Nations in Vienna, four years as a safety engineer at Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, twelve years as a private contractor, eight years as an employee of an electrical utility where I became a minor expert on iodine chemistry and the remaining years before retirement in the private sector working for a medium sized and then a large engineering consulting firm. Those years with the consulting firms were a fantastic time, during which the variety of the work, the technical challenges, and especially my outstanding colleagues were the greatest reward.
Along the way, I picked up a serious travel bug, a deep interest in languages, an addiction to cycling in Europe, a taste for wine, the enjoyment of many cuisines, a love of cooking, an urge to make bread at the drop of a hat, and a fixation on history that roared back to life from a fifteen year pupation. Throughout my life, there have been powerful undercurrents of philosophy, reading, and writing, and in my retirement the last-mentioned of these, writing, has been fanned to vigorous life. My wife and our two cats look at all this in bemusement.

For all these reasons, I consider myself a lucky guy.

Reviews

[Saige · Rating 1 out of 5]

Found this book in a thrift shop, and wanted to support a Canadian author but unfortunately this is one of the worst books I have ever read to be frank.

It’s incredibly scattered in its storytelling, trying to weave countless “crazy” mystery characters into the plot at random intersections that make no sense.

The book it’s also filled with endless food descriptions that add nothing to the story, no parallels, no hinted imagery, just endless boring food descriptions.

The author also struggles to write realistic dialogue. The adults talk in such odd ways to one another, as if it’s a 50s crime movie sometimes, while the conversations between father and 5-year-old daughter range from toddler speak to dialogue a kindergarten would never know. The dad also give the 5-year-old alcohol multiple times, as a silly goofy thing??

Again I’m all for people pursuing their writing passion and have no doubt this was a labour of love, but unfortunately it does not make it a good novel.

P.S. Pretty sure there’s still a body under the manure pile at the end of the book that the main character doesn’t seem to be worried about being found.

[Marie-France Leclerc · Rating 4 out of 5]

It was a slow start, but I became intrigued by where this was going and how it would end.

[Deb Mohr · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a surprisingly good book and not at all what the title suggests. #1526.