Long Island Iced Tina

March 08, 2021

Long Island Iced Tina

Long Island Iced Tina (A Catering Hall Mystery)
by Maria DiRico

About Long Island Iced Tina

Long Island Iced Tina (A Catering Hall Mystery)
Cozy Mystery
2nd in Series
Publisher: Kensington (February 23, 2021)
Mass Market Paperback: 288 pages
ISBN-10: 1496725352
ISBN-13: 978-1496725356
Digital ASIN: B089NCJ9NS

Mia Carina is back in the borough of Queens—in charge of the family catering hall, Belle View Banquet Manor, and keeping her nonna company. But some events—like murder—are not the kind you can schedule . . .

Mia’s newly pregnant friend Nicole plans to hold a shower at Belle View—but Nicole also has to attend one that her competitive (and mysteriously rich) stepmother, Tina, is throwing at the fanciest place in Queens. It’s a good chance for Mia to snoop on a competitor, especially since doing a search for “how to run a catering hall” can get you only so far.

Mia tags along at the lavish party, but the ambience suffers at Nicole’s Belle View shower when a fight breaks out—and then, oddly, a long-missing and valuable stolen painting is unwrapped by the mom-to-be. Tina is clearly shocked to see it. But not as shocked as Mia is when, soon afterward, she spots the lifeless body of a party guest floating in the marina . . .

Italian recipes included!

Mia Carina Guest Post

Hi, Mia Carina here. I’m the Senior Event Planner and Assistant General Manager at Belle View Catering Manor in Astoria, Queens, New York. My father won Belle View as payment for a debt rung up by a gambler who was a regular at one of the poker games Dad ran for the Boldano crime family. He’s gotta run Belle View as a legitimate business, and since I don’t want him going back to The Life, I’m gonna make sure that happens.

When it comes to events, I do cut friends the occasional favor. Take my pal Nicole, who’s pregnant with her first kid. Her mom and grandma were throwing her a baby shower at Belle View, and I wanted to make sure it was a happy occasion, especially considering all the grief she’s been dealing with on account of her stepmonster, Tina. Nicole and her mother Linda play nice with the woman, but grandma Philomene hates her. And I’m not too fond of her either. She’s a big show-off, spending buckets of dough just to one-up everyone else. Anyhoo, I had no idea where she was getting all the money and couldn’t shake the feeling there was some hinky business attached to it.

And guess what? My instincts were right as usual. (It’s easy to understand the criminal mind when you grow up in a family where it’s basically their line of business.) A painting stolen twenty years ago suddenly showed up among Nicole’s gifts at her baby shower and Tina passed out. Then a body showed up floating in the marina behind Belle View. The police couldn’t tie it to my dad or the Boldano Family much as they wanted to, thank goodness. But they did tie it to Nicole’s family, which sent my friend to the hospital in premature labor.

I’m not gonna let the sketchy past of a sketchy woman harm my friend’s baby. No way, no how. If the police can’t figure out who the murderer is, I’m gonna help them whether they like it or not. But I gotta balance my sleuthing with helping my own grandmother with something. See, the late husband of one of her friends appeared to his widow in a dream saying he was buried without shoes. Now my nonna, Elisabetta, is going to funerals to try and drop a pair of men’s shoes in the casket so they get sent up to her friend’s husband. And she’s suckered me into this, too.

Boy, do I lead a life that’s molto pazzo — that’s “very crazy” for anyone reading this who doesn’t speak Italian.

About Maria DiRico

Maria DiRico

Maria DiRico is the pseudonym for Ellen Byron, author of the award winning, USA Today bestselling Cajun Country Mysteries. Born in Queens, New York, she is first-generation Italian-American on her mother’s side and the granddaughter of a low-level Jewish mobster on her father’s side. She grew up visiting the Astoria Manor and Grand Bay Marina catering halls, which were run by her Italian mother’s family in Queens and have become the inspiration for her Catering Hall Mystery Series. DiRico has been a writer-producer for hit television series like Wings and Just Shoot Me, and her first play, Graceland, appears in the Best Short Plays collection. She’s a freelance journalist, with over 200 articles published in national magazines, and previously worked as a cater-waiter for Martha Stewart, a credit she never tires of sharing. A native New Yorker who attended Tulane University, Ellen lives in Los Angeles with her husband, daughter, and two rescue dogs.

Website – https://www.ellenbyron.com/catering-hall-mysteries

Chicks on the Case – http://chicksonthecase.net/

Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/CateringHallMysteries/

Twitter – https://twitter.com/ellenbyronla

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