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Cook and Inspector Mysteries #4
Close Encounters of the Deadly Kind
Gourmet cuisine, UFO-chasers, and government conspiracies collide in this cosmic culinary caper…
Angie Amalfi is sure she’s finally come up with the perfect career—owner and head chef of Fantasy Dinners, bringing fantasies to life through catered dinner parties. But when her only clients turn out to be the eccentric members of a group of devoted UFO-chasers and government conspiracy connoisseurs, she realizes she's cooking with a whole new set of ingredients. As she concocts dishes to satisfy their extraterrestrial appetites, Angie stumbles upon a saucer-sized mystery.
At the same time, San Francisco Homicide Inspector, Paavo Smith, finds himself knee-deep in several murders as mysterious as Area 51, and as gruesome as stories involving “extraterrestrial abductions.”
Angie finds herself drawn ever deeper into a whirlpool of Men in Black, Roswell lore, and suspicious sightings. When she finds a connection between her clients and Paavo's investigations, she fears she’s rocketed herself her into a close encounter that has nothing to do with the food aliens eat. Will Angie and Paavo solve the mystery before it's lights out for our favorite Earthlings?
Strap in for a supernova adventure. The truth is out there!
This is a fully rewritten and reimagined rendering of an earlier mystery, A Cook in Time.
Angie Amalfi is sure she’s finally come up with the perfect career—owner and head chef of Fantasy Dinners, bringing fantasies to life through catered dinner parties. But when her only clients turn out to be the eccentric members of a group of devoted UFO-chasers and government conspiracy connoisseurs, she realizes she's cooking with a whole new set of ingredients. As she concocts dishes to satisfy their extraterrestrial appetites, Angie stumbles upon a saucer-sized mystery.
At the same time, San Francisco Homicide Inspector, Paavo Smith, finds himself knee-deep in several murders as mysterious as Area 51, and as gruesome as stories involving “extraterrestrial abductions.”
Angie finds herself drawn ever deeper into a whirlpool of Men in Black, Roswell lore, and suspicious sightings. When she finds a connection between her clients and Paavo's investigations, she fears she’s rocketed herself her into a close encounter that has nothing to do with the food aliens eat. Will Angie and Paavo solve the mystery before it's lights out for our favorite Earthlings?
Strap in for a supernova adventure. The truth is out there!
This is a fully rewritten and reimagined rendering of an earlier mystery, A Cook in Time.
242 pages, Kindle Edition
Published July 2, 2024
26 people are currently reading
17 people want to read
About the author
Joanne Pence
76 books192 followersJoanne Pence is a USA Today best-selling and award winning author of two mystery series, contemporary and historical romance, fantasy and thrillers. She is the author of the Angie Amalfi culinary mystery series, which is still in print after twenty years, and now has 15 books (the latest, COOKING SPIRITS was an April 2013 release), and a novella (Cook's Christmas Capers, Dec. 2013). She has just begun a new series, the Rebecca Mayfield mysteries. ONE O'CLOCK HUSTLE is the first full-length novel, and THE THIRTEENTH SANTA is a novella which shows how the two main characters met.
Joanne's books have won many awards and honors, including RWA's Golden Heart and Rita Award nominations, the Independent Book Seller's Golden Quill, the Daphne du Maurier award, the Willa Cather Literary Award in Historical Fiction (for DANCE WITH A GUNFIGHTER), and the Idaho Top Fiction Award for ANCIENT ECHOES.
Joanne was born and raised in San Francisco and now makes her home in the foothills of Boise. She has been president of the Boise chapter of Sisters in Crime, a founder and board member of the Popular Fiction Association of Idaho, and founding member and current board member of the Idaho Writers Guild. A graduate of U.C. Berkeley with a master's degree in journalism, Joanne has written for magazines, worked for the federal government, and taught school in Japan.
Joanne's books have won many awards and honors, including RWA's Golden Heart and Rita Award nominations, the Independent Book Seller's Golden Quill, the Daphne du Maurier award, the Willa Cather Literary Award in Historical Fiction (for DANCE WITH A GUNFIGHTER), and the Idaho Top Fiction Award for ANCIENT ECHOES.
Joanne was born and raised in San Francisco and now makes her home in the foothills of Boise. She has been president of the Boise chapter of Sisters in Crime, a founder and board member of the Popular Fiction Association of Idaho, and founding member and current board member of the Idaho Writers Guild. A graduate of U.C. Berkeley with a master's degree in journalism, Joanne has written for magazines, worked for the federal government, and taught school in Japan.
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July 31, 2025
Close Encounters
This story was getting too spooky. I wish I could stop being scared of stories or I won’t be able to read Them more.
This story was getting too spooky. I wish I could stop being scared of stories or I won’t be able to read Them more.
Displaying 1 of 1 review