The Golden Spoon

By Nate Feldman

Summary:

A dead body is found on top of a tent.  Who was it and why were they killed?  

Betsy Martin is the host of Bake Week, a reality TV show where people are recruited throughout the United States to compete against one another in hopes of winning the Golden Spoon, the award for the best baker.  The show takes place at Grafton Manor, her family's estate in Vermont.  

The six individuals picked for the tenth year of the show, Lottie, Stella, Hannah, Gerald, Peter, and Pradyumna come from a variety of backgrounds and experiences with baking, and each have their own unique reasons for taking part in the show.  

As the competition progresses, some contestants feel their bakes were sabotaged, and others are being taken advantage of by the show's hosts.  Meanwhile, some are trying to unlock mysteries of Grafton Manor.  All of this will climax in someone's death and lead to who did this and why.

Opinion:

The nice thing about the Golden Spoon is it's easy to read and moves quickly.  Jessa Maxwell, the author, wrote it very clearly and with great pace.  It's a good book to read while traveling somewhere. I will also add that it inspired me to bake more.  The scenes with bakeoffs between the characters were fun to read. 

I must say I was not particularly fond of the characters in the story.  Also, the mystery was not all that intriguing, nor was the revelation in the end all of that surprising.

So, I'd give this book somewhere between three to three and a half stars out of five.