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Summary
Summary
The indomitable Chas Wheatley is back, in a tale of restaurants, rivalry, and murder most-hoped-for.
Ringo Laurenge is the new hire at the Washington Examiner, an ambitious young reporter with the looks and the brains to become a star. The trouble is, a few staffers at the Examiner would characterize him as an arrogant and sadistic back-stabbing blowhard who deserves to die. And Chas Wheatley is obsessively, shamefully among them. Her worries over Ringo have even begun to cut into her love life. Not only does this guy steal other reporters' stories, he also has a fascination with power, and is determined to destroy a restaurant that has become the focus of Chas's latest research.
While Ringo runs rampant at the Examiner, plots to crush Chas's friends, and cooks up ways to horn in on her territory, the question becomes not whether he will be taken out, but when and who will finally be driven to do it? For Ringo has made more than one enemy since arriving in town, and in a case like this, Chas isn't even sure she wants to find out which one of them has finally had enough.
For mystery lovers and foodies alike, Who's Afraid of Virginia Ham? is a deliciously wicked whodunit with all the right ingredients, served up by the restaurant and newspaper worlds' consummate insider, Phyllis Richman.
Reviews (4)
Publisher's Weekly Review
In her third excursion into culinary crime (after Murder on the Gravy Train and the Agatha-nominated The Butter Did It) Richman throws in the requisite ingredients for a tasty whodunit, but with mixed success. Food editor Chas Wheatley is fuming over the Washington Examiner's latest hire: slick, slimy Ringo Laurenge. He may have the stuff of great reporters, but he also has a knack for annoying just about everyone else on the staff. Chas has been working on a story about America's most expensive restaurants, but she makes the mistake of telling her new colleague about it. She soon discovers that Laurenge is worming himself into a position to take over the story and leave Chas out in the cold. Her best friend, African-American theater critic Sherele Travis, encounters a more vicious side of Laurenge when he brutally assaults her. As Richman goes to tedious lengths to build a damning portrait of the obnoxious reporter, Chas and Sherele delve into Laurenge's past, trying to find some way of spiking his guns. Long after many readers will have given up on ever getting to a dead body, someone on the staff resorts to murder as the solution, when Laurenge dies from apparently lethal Virginia ham served at a work function. Though the author writes with clarity and passion about food, she explores character at the expense of suspense. The anticlimactic solution to the crime comes too late. Most readers will have put the book down and gone in search of food, thanks to the mouth-watering descriptions of the goodies Chas likes to eat. Agent, Bob Barnett. 7-city author tour. (May 3) Forecast: With The Butter Did It to be a CBS-TV Movie of the Week this fall and other film adaptations to follow, Richman should make a delicious leap in sales. (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Kirkus Review
No doubt about it: Ringo Laurenge, the Washington Examiner s new business reporter, is having a corrosive effect on the once-collegial newsroom. Financial desk veteran Vince Davis, the first to smell a rat, watched Ringo massage his Rolodex and, using his business beat as an excuseafter all, every restaurant, theater, and government office is also a businesshorn in on everyone elses turf. Restaurant critic Chas Wheatley (Murder on the Gravy Train, 1999, etc.) feels the pinch when Ringo gets editor-in-chief Bull Stannards approval to fly to L.A. for a story on the $300 prix fixe dinners at Ginza Sushiko. A Prince Georges County reporter named Linda gets skunked when she lets Ringo work with her on a story about the culture of crime, which he then takessolo, of courseon the television circuit, leaving Linda to deal with their disgruntled sources. Even Dave Zeeger, Chass live-in, whose initial backing of Ringo threatens their domestic tranquility, ends up getting scooped by his new colleague. But with Chass best friend, Sherele Travis, Ringos affront isnt professional but personal: Feigning a postprandial drunken stupor, he lures her to his apartment and tries to assault her. So it's no surprise that when, at long last, Ringo keels over dead during the Examiners pre-Thanksgiving feast, Shereles the one the police zero in on. Richmans prose is as sharp as ever, but like a novice waiter, she draws out the appetizer interminably, then presents the main course, the dessert, and the check only minutes before closing time. Author tour
Booklist Review
Taking a darker and more textured turn from her previous foodie mysteries (including The Butter Did It, 1997), Richman, recently retired as food critic of the Washington Post, places her heroine, Chas Wheatley, on the staff of the fictional Washington Examiner. Chas, midlife and up-tempo, loves her job as restaurant reviewer; her romance with the paper's investigative reporter; her best friend, the sleek and beautiful theater critic; and her slightly daffy, twentysomething daughter. When a slick young reporter named Ringo oozes into the newsroom and begins to write brilliant stories, Chas tries to keep her wits about her. Ringo charms with one hand while stealing ideas with the other, and the plot is a case study in offhand viciousness--and how hard it is to define and defuse. What with food tidbits, tips on how to run a restaurant, newsroom paraphernalia, and reflections on the tides of friendship between women, the world of the novel is fascinating even without crime. When Ringo is finally done in, we can all breathe a sigh of relief--or can we? --GraceAnne A. DeCandido
Library Journal Review
In her third culinary mystery (Murder on the Gravy Train, The Butter Did It), Chas Wheatley, food critic for a Washington, DC newspaper (and amateur sleuth), reels with shock after the paper's new hire, a charming but dangerously ambitious and deceitful young man, tries to put one of her favorite restaurants out of business. Fortunately, Chas, by now knowing the score, goes on the offensive, digs into his past for ammunition, and counterattacks. The man's murder, already foreshadowed, comes as no surprise, nor does the lengthy list of willing suspects. Very nicely written, with plenty of attention to food, character, and motive; an excellent selection. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
