CIA librarian turned ice cream shop owner Riley Rhodes is having a busy Halloween season, coinciding with her October 31st date of birth. While she and her family are used to postponing her birthday celebrations so that they can honor each occasion separately, someone else in her Connecticut town is intent on combining the date with a pretty significant personal milestone.

Wealthy innkeeper Diantha Collins has always loved spooky season and wants her latest wedding to incorporate both Halloween and Día de los Muertos. Her fiancé and head chef, Dominic, is happy to indulge her. As part of the weekend-long festivities, they commission Riley’s ice creamery, Udderly Delicious, to create an appropriately themed wedding cake to be delivered to their posh Inn on the Green the evening before their nuptials.

Riley ends up coming back later that night after an emergency phone call from her former Girl Scout Troop Leader, Ruthie Adams, who also happens to be the inn’s head housekeeper. The historic venue has been closed to everyone except family, employees, and one very special guest ahead of the wedding. That guest is Jenira Ford, the sweetheart of the Skylark Channel and the star of their upcoming movie, Bound for Love. Members of the Collins family have important roles in Bound for Love’s filming, which is taking place in Penniman at the same time as the wedding festivities. Many of the locals are giddy at the prospect, some to the point of recklessness. After Jenira catches two young members of the housekeeping staff taking illicit photos of her, she has them fired, leaving Ruthie shorthanded. In order to entice Riley into helping out while management looks for permanent replacements, Ruthie offers her a free overnight stay in one of the Inn’s historic, and very expensive, rooms.

This is not an offer that history-loving Riley can resist. Little does she realize that her presence at the Inn will land her right in the middle of chaos after she and Ruthie discover Diantha dead during their housekeeping rounds the next morning. Riley has already overheard a bunch of eyebrow-raising conversations between various guests and employees. The memory of those, along with her keen eye for detail, cause her to believe that Diantha was the victim of foul play even before the coroner officially declares the same verdict.

When Riley’s friend Mary Anne becomes the prime suspect in Diantha’s murder due to her well-known grievances against her ex-husband Dominic, Riley realizes that she’ll have to assist Police Chief Jack Voelker in rapidly solving the case—whether he wants her help or not (he does not). Complicating matters is the Skylark film shoot and the unwelcome reemergence of a figure from Riley’s past. Will Riley be able to sort through all these seemingly unrelated issues and discover who really killed Diantha before her friend takes the fall?

This was another smart installment of the Ice Cream Shop Mystery series that effortlessly balances a cunningly woven murder plot with realistically tangled interpersonal relationships. I thoroughly enjoyed the subplot with Paulette and Sprinkles—especially the latter’s crush on a movie star. This novel’s ending points to the next installment happening outside of Riley’s home state; I’m excited to see what happens there too!

There were two recipes for hot fudge sauce included. One decadent but relatively complicated, and the other fast and fabulous. No prizes for guessing which one I chose to try.

Fast and Fabulous Hot Fudge Sauce

Ingredients

1 cup sugar

1 cup heavy cream

1 cup dark cocoa powder

1 stick (½ cup) salted butter, cut into 8-10 pieces

Instructions

Put everything in a small saucepan over medium heat. Stir constantly until the butter melts and everything combines into a velvety smooth mixture.

Pour into a heat-safe container (mason jars work well) and cool. Use while still warm or store it in the fridge and rewarm in a bowl of hot water until it’s the temperature you like.

This is honestly the perfect hot fudge sauce, and I have no idea why anyone would even bother with another variation. It does take a little while to come together—I even cut my butter into 32 little cubes instead of just 8 to speed up the melding—but the result is astounding. Even on its own, the sauce is rich but not too heavy.

That said, this hot fudge is definitely best when paired with (another) dessert! I decided to make a sundae with vanilla ice cream and fresh strawberries that I topped with the sauce. It was absolute perfection. I also drizzled some of the fudge over pound cake the next day and felt rather like I was enjoying delicious, restaurant-quality chocolate fondue. I highly recommend whipping this up the next time you’re looking to jazz up your usual sweet treat with a knockout condiment.

Next week, we stay in New England to make some delicious fusion food while investigating the murderous tail of a case long gone cold. Do join me!

See also: Cooking the Books: Murder Is a Piece of Cake by Valerie Burns