Sandra Balzo

Maggy Thorsen spells her name unusually. But that's not the only unusual thing about her. Although a bit bitter about her impending divorce, she doesn’t let that cloud her judgment — or her curiosity and sense of fair play — and sense of humor. How could you not love a woman who calls the choice between two witnesses shocked by a terrible death “[t]the lesser of two feebles”? Ya gotta love her!

Forty-two-year-old Maggy was living the suburban dream in the fictional small town of show more Brookhills, Wisconsin, just west of Milwaukee, when her dentist husband leaves her for his 24-year-old dental hygienist. Maggy, a public-relations and event management guru for Brookhill's First National Bank chucks the corporate life and persuades her longtime friend Caron Egan and one of Caron’s friends, Patricia Harper, to open a coffee shop in a strip mall, the eponymous Uncommon Grounds. On opening day, Maggy and Caron discover their partner dead on the floor of the coffee shop; the police immediately realize that Patricia’s death was no heart attack or accident, but murder.

Kindly Police Chief Gary Donovan, a longtime friend of Maggy’s, soon gets shoved aside by newly elected county Sheriff Pavlik, a newcomer from Chicago eager to make a name for himself. The brusque and surly Pavlik sees Maggy and Caron as natural suspects, and Maggy decides that, with the pair of them such easy targets, she had better start investigating the murder herself if she’s going to clear them — and discover the truth of what happened to Patricia and why. Luckily, Maggy has brains, useful skills from her corporate days, and plenty of pluck.

Like Maggy, author Sandra Balzo is herself a Wisconsin native who spent 20 years in public relations, events management and publicity. She’s has penned a breezy, funny cozy in the vein of Anne George or Carolyn Hart. The novel was so good that I bought the sequel, Grounds for Murder, as soon as I finished Uncommon Grounds. There’s no higher praise than that! show less

That’s not a typo in the title: Jo is JoLynne Penn-Williams, the events manager for a dedication of the commuter train line that will run between Milwaukee and Brookhills, Wisconsin, a small fictional town located 15 miles west of Milwaukee.

Maggy Thorsen, co-owner of Uncommon Grounds coffee shop, is on hand at the celebration with her partner, the prickly real-estate agent Sarah Kingston, when JoLynne turns up dead, marring the celebration.

Poor Maggy deserves a break: First, in Uncommon show more Grounds, her marriage broke up when her dentist husband recently left her for his 24-year-old dental hygienist. Then, when Maggy begins a new life and a new business, her coffee shop was destroyed in a freak May blizzard in Brewed, Crude and Tattooed, and the re-opening nearly spoiled due to mayhem in From the Grounds Up. But Maggy’s not about to catch a break in A Cup of Jo, the sixth novel in the series. Turns out the pretty and petite victim JoLynne, although married, was very promiscuous — even bedding her sister’s boyfriend and, according to rumor, Maggy’s main squeeze, sexy Sheriff Jake Pavlik. When she’s not waxing jealous about promiscuous JoLynne, Maggy’s worried about Milwaukee County Executive Wynona Counsel, who once dated Pavlik, too. It’s not a pretty picture, but, considering Maggy’s history — she was oblivious of her ex’s philandering — it’s understandable.

So who killed JoLynne? Was it her cuckolded husband, whom police have arrested? Or could one of JoLynne’s many lovers or their spurned wives or girlfriends have decided that enough was enough? You’ll be rooting for Maggy to find out the truth. While most will also be rooting for Maggy to patch things up with Jake, I’m ambivalent. Maggy’s a strong woman, and Jake’s a bit bullying and emotionally distant. As the kitchen magnet proclaims, “It's better to have loved and lost, than to live with a psycho for the rest of your life.” Jake’s not a psycho, but Maggy can do better.

Still, don’t let my demur put you off. A Cup of Jo will brew up a funny and clever page-turner you’ll drink in no time flat. show less

Coffee shop owner Maggy Thorsen doesn’t have the best relationship with her ex-husband, Ted. No wonder, as he dumped her for his much-younger dental hygienist. Their relationship doesn’t improve when Ted’s new partner in his dental practice ends up sailing out of his office window.

Maggy — despite her bad karma with Ted — ends up looking into the death of oral surgeon William Swope, which first appears to be a suicide. But Maggy realizes otherwise. She also realizes that her show more relationship with her handsome, sexy boyfriend, Sheriff Jake Pavlik, seems to be nearly as moribund as the late Dr. Swope. What’s a middle-aged single mom to do?

I adored this ninth entry in author Sandra Balzo’s coffeehouse mystery series: funny, cleverly plotted, with lots of snarky dialogue. Here’s to hoping she’s brewing lots more! show less

Coffee shop owner Maggy Thorsen and her new business partner, real-estate maven Sarah Kingston, think they smell a rat — literally. A stench is coming from below their store, Uncommon Grounds, now located at a renovated commuter train station in a space Sarah inherited. When the pair investigate, the dead rat is a metaphorical rather than literal one: Brigid Ferndale, Sarah’s erstwhile sales apprentice, who had reported Sarah and Kingston Realty to Wisconsin’s Department of Regulation show more and Licensing for not adequately training her.

Naturally, Sarah fears she’s the No. 1 suspect in Brigid’s murder. How did Brigid get into a blocked-off underground room — one that Maggy and most others didn’t even know existed? Sarah knew that, in the 1970s, Mafia henchmen had a secret waiting room for trains to Chicago, but she’d never seen it or known where it was. Who did know and enticed Brigid there? And does Brigid’s death have any connection to the recent murders of two real-estate agents during showings? Maggy and her boyfriend, Brookhills County Sheriff Jake Pavlik, think there must be, and they fear that Sarah could well be the next realtor to die.

Meanwhile, Ward Chitown, a onetime popular Chicago television host and investigative reporter, has come to Brookhills to produce a show on the Brookhills Massacre, a 1974 shootout between the Mafia and the FBI. (Chitown’s father had been the FBI’s special agent-in-charge during the raid. The elder man was one of only two survivors — and only G-man not killed.) The production of the special program makes a crazy situation that much crazier.

I love Triple Shot, the seventh novel in Sandra Balzo’s Maggy Thorsen series. First of all, how could you not love a book with a line like this one:

When you’re as close as the sheriff and I were, who needed words? We could practically read each other’s minds.

Pavlik’s was thinking: How the hell did I get myself involved with this broad? It’s like I’m Lassie, she’s Timmy, and every day is a new well.

I almost died when reading that one! The novel is peppered with clever one-liners and funny situations, and the mystery proves really engrossing. (I never guessed the perpetrator.) Triple Shot reminds me of the Stephanie Plum series without mentions of erect nipples and nether regions and before Janet Evanovich began phoning her mystery novels in.

Hapless Maggy has been through a lot as the series has progressed, suffering her share of betrayals and corpses. But she has always rebounded, and Maggy prevails here, never abandoning her friend Sarah and working tirelessly to get at the truth. Triple Shot makes for an excellent read. Part of the reason is Maggy herself: She doesn’t just serve up a mean triple-shot café cubano or latte; she makes you wish that you could join her drinking one and giggling over the perfectly coiffed blonde Brookhills Barbies in their designer tennis togs.
Highly recommended when you seek a short, breezy read. show less