Book Review: Brewed Awakening | Cleo Coyle

This was a delightful twist on the cozy mystery! Very different than any story I’d read before and so much fun! In Cleo Coyle’s Brewed Awakening, a coffee-shop owner and expert barista awakens on a park bench with no memory of the past fifteen years. And unfortunately, she also has been missing for several days and seems to be the sole witness to a missing person’s case—if only she could remember it! A fun, sweet, and unique cozy mystery that I highly recommend!

About the Book

From Cleo Coyle, the New York Times bestselling author of Shot in the Dark and Dead Cold Brew, comes a delicious new entry in the “fun and gripping” (Huffington Post) Coffeehouse Mysteries.

When coffeehouse manager Clare Cosi awakens on a bench in Washington Square Park, she has no idea she’s been missing for days, or that her friends and family have been frantic with worry. Now that she’s back, everyone is overjoyed, including a handsome NYPD detective who claims to be her fiance. But to Mike Quinn’s crushing distress, Clare doesn’t remember him, or much of anything about the last fifteen years of her life.

Clare’s missing memory is tied to a crime she witnessed. An acquaintance of Clare’s elegant employer–and fellow member of an exclusive Gotham circle known as “The Ladies Who Brunch“–invited Clare to her posh hotel to sample gourmet wedding cakes. After their indulgent tasting, they headed to the parking garage, where a camera captured a masked figure with a gun confronting the hotel heiress with Clare looking on. Did the kidnapper take Clare, too? The camera went dark, just like Clare’s memory. Soon authorities grow suspicious. Is Clare really a victim? Or merely acting like one? Evidence is mounting that she set the woman up.

To clear her name, Clare must find a way to reclaim her memories and rescue the heiress before this high-stakes crime ends in tragedy. Otherwise, instead of walking down the aisle, Clare may find herself perp-walking to prison as an accomplice to kidnapping and murder. 

Reflection

So, I haven’t read any of this series and I was shocked to learn that Brewed Awakening is book 18 in the Coffeehouse Mysteries! It easily read as a standalone and I felt completely caught up on the character back stories, while unspoiled on the previous 17 mysteries (which I definitely am reading after loving this so much)!

Opening with a glimpse into Clare’s proposal, the book flashes forward two months to Clare waking up on a park bench with no memory of how she got there. And pretty soon we realize that her memory gap may be even larger than we thought, as she runs into a pedestrian with a smart phone and seems to have no idea what it is. Returning to the coffee shop that she thankfully worked at fifteen years ago and still does today, Clare is greeted with open arms. Everyone was worried because she has been missing for several days!

And they are even more worried when they realize that she has no memory of the last fifteen years, including her engagement, current role running the coffeehouse, and her daughter growing up. But the more pressing issue arises when she gets locked away in a memory ward and her friends need to bust her out. On the run, Clare holds the key to the missing heiress, if only she can remember!

I loved the way this mystery delved into memory and sensory memory in particular. Clare’s very clever friends quickly are able to test that her memories are locked away somewhere, as she can remember specific coffee beans that her ex-husband brought back in the years after her memory went away. As she has built her life and passion around coffee, it seems to reawaken bits of her memory. It was fun and scary watching Clare try to remember. I worried she might not remember anything!

The conclusion to this was a lot of fun, and I loved that we got a healthy explanation of how the case was solved and what happened in the aftermath. Did Clare recover her memories? Was the heiress found? What about the person or people behind the kidnapping???

Also, the recipes at the end are seriously divine! I actually made Matteo’s pasta and YUM!!! Don’t skip those!

A fun read that I can’t recommend enough! Thank you Berkley for my copy. Opinions are my own.

About the Author

CLEO COYLE is the New York Times bestselling pseudonym for Alice Alfonsi, writing in collaboration with her husband, Marc Cerasini. As Cleo Coyle, they write the long-running Coffeehouse Mysteries. Their brand new Coffeehouse entry, (#18) BREWED AWAKENING , now a national bestseller, was praised as a “Poignant Page-Turner” by Booklist and has been honored on 5 Best of Year lists by reviewers. Their previous entry (#17) SHOT IN THE DARK was awarded a Starred Review by Library Journal, chosen as its “Mystery Pick of the Month,” and honored by Fresh Fiction as a finalist among the best mysteries of 2018. Their 16th Coffeehouse title, DEAD COLD BREW , was chosen as a Top 10 Best Mysteries for Book Clubs 2017.

With well over 1 million books in print, Cleo Coyle has gained an enthusiastic following. The 1st book in their Coffeehouse series, ON WHAT GROUNDS, is now in its 20th printing; three entries have now earned starred reviews, including BILLIONAIRE BLEND, which was honored with a Kirkus Star and called “a highly satisfying mystery” by Publishers Weekly. Every book in the series has hit national bestseller lists, including HOLIDAY BUZZ, which was a Top-10 New York Times bestseller.

Cleo also writes a popular mystery series set in a New England book shop. She created THE HAUNTED BOOKSHOP MYSTERIES in 2003. The first book was originally published under the name Alice Kimberly. A national bestseller for Penguin’s Berkley imprint, THE GHOST AND MRS. McCLURE is currently in its 12th printing. Penguin published four more of Cleo’s Haunted Bookshop Mystery titles between 2004 and 2009, all of them bestsellers. After a hiatus of ten years, Cleo’s longtime publisher released her new Haunted Bookshop Mystery THE GHOST AND THE BOGUS BESTSELLER . It quickly became an actual bestseller and was honored as a “Best Book of 2018” by Suspense Magazine, as well as a “Fresh Pick” by Fresh Fiction, which called it “A magnificent cold case mystery.” Look for Cleo’s upcoming Haunted Bookshop Mystery, (#7) THE GHOST AND THE HAUNTED PORTRAIT, to be published in 2020. (The book is now available for pre-order.)

When not haunting coffeehouses or hunting ghosts, Alice and Marc are NY Times bestselling media tie-in writers who have penned properties for Lucasfilm, NBC, Fox, Disney, Imagine, and MGM. One of those projects (ghostwritten by Alice) was named by Entertainment Weekly as the best media tie-in book written that year.

Cleo Coyle enjoys hearing from readers. Visit her virtual Village Blend coffeehouse at www.CoffeehouseMystery.com, where she also posts recipes and coffee picks. You can keep in touch with Cleo by signing up for her free E-newsletter. Simply write an e-mail that says “Sign me up” and send it to CoffeehouseMystery@gmail.com

Although both Alice and Marc were born and raised in small towns near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, they did not meet until they moved to New York City, where both began their post-college careers. After falling in love, Alice and Marc were married. Now they live and work in New York City, where they write independently and together, cook like crazy, care for their stray cat rescues, haunt coffeehouses, and hunt ghosts.