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As a former registered nurse, Nancy J. Cohen helped people with their physical aches and pains, but she longed to soothe their troubles in a different way. The siren call of storytelling lured her from nursing into the exciting world of fiction. Wishing she could wield a curling iron with the same skill as crafting a story, she created hairdresser Marla Vail as a stylist with a nose for crime and a knack for exposing people’s secrets.
Titles in The Bad Hair Day Mysteries have been named Best Cozy Mystery by Suspense Magazine, won a Readers’ Favorite gold medal and a RONE Award, earned first place in the Chanticleer International Book Awards and third place in the Arizona Literary Awards. Nancy’s instructional guide, Writing the Cozy Mystery, was nominated for an Agatha Award, earned first place in the Royal Palm Literary Awards and the Topshelf Magazine Book Awards, and won a gold medal in the President’s Book Awards. Her imaginative romances have proven popular with fans as well. These books have won the HOLT Medallion and Best Book in Romantic SciFi/Fantasy at The Romance Reviews.
A featured speaker at libraries, conferences, and community events, Nancy is listed in Contemporary Authors, Poets & Writers, and Who’s Who in U.S. Writers, Editors, & Poets. She is a past president of Florida Romance Writers and Mystery Writers of America Florida Chapter. When not busy writing, Nancy enjoys cooking, fine dining, cruising, and visiting Disney World.
Reviewed by Liz Konkel for Readers' Favorite
Trimmed to Death by Nancy J. Cohen is the fifteenth book in the Bad Hair Day Mystery series. Marla has put her baking to the test after being convinced to enter her coconut fudge pie into the bake-off. When a scavenger hunt breaks out, Marla can’t resist joining the fun until what she finds is the body of a fellow contestant. Investigating the mystery draws her into the world of food and takes her mind off her recent decision to expand her family. With the help of her husband and her best friend, she explores the inside life of professional cooking where she uncovers shocking motives and a surprising discovery that puts her in danger.
Marla has made a major decision in her own life by deciding it’s time for a baby. Nancy J. Cohen has kept Marla on this path which has seen Marla grow from an amateur sleuth to a wife and stepmother to now planning to have a baby. The series has introduced several changes for Marla and each one has been met with thrilling surprises and a delightful step forward. It’s nice to see how far she’s come since the beginning and to see her content in her family unit, which remains at the heart of the story with her husband and stepdaughter as her main sounding boards. Once again, she dons her sleuthing hat and pries her way into dangerous situations while helping her husband out with the latest mystery. The two make a delightful pair as they provide each other with a constant support system with the love between them growing with each new installment.
The mystery is exciting and delicious as Marla enters the world of food where she meets a variety of characters whose lives revolve around cooking. This pulls her into different aspects related to food from cookbooks to cooking shows. The suspects are suspicious of motives that give Marla a good look at this cut-throat world. Trimmed to Death is a delightful and delicious mystery with humor, action, and suspense while Cohen provides plenty of surprises for longtime readers of the Bad Hair Day mysteries.
