Mind Your Own Beeswax

Queen Bee Mystery No. 2

By Hannah Reed

Paperback, 293 pages, $7.99

“I missed the clues leading up to my honeybees’ finely orchestrated plan to abandon me. They took off right before noon on a sunny May day, rising as one large buzzing ball with the queen in the center, where she would be protected by the entire honeybee community — workers, housekeepers, nurses, guards and drones.”

And thus begins "Mind Your Own Beeswax," the second in Hannah Reed’s terrific queen bee mystery series that serves up all kinds of interesting beekeeping information and honey recipes, a wacky and totally likeable cast of characters and a frenzied hive of story activity.

I’ll admit it, I love books with short chapters so you can read to the end of one at bedtime and put it down. The problem is, Reed's writing doesn't let you do that. Her keen storytelling won't let you put the book down at the end of a chapter — you can't help but read on.

In honeybee colonies, girls rule. They also rule in main character Story (I don’t do pretend well) Fischer’s “Queen Bee” world, too — although she's known as Missy to her friends in Moraine, Wis., along the Oconomowoc River, and those friends don’t include the local police chief.

“So if I was going to bring out the worst in the police chief, he was going to bring out the worst in me, too.”

When Missy talks her sister Holly into heading out into the woods to recapture her swarm of wayward bees, and they find a body — let the mystery begin.

Although they heard gun shots in the woods during the bee search, they weren’t concerned. This was the woods in the country where many people hunt, and, they are equally trusting enough to leave their doors unlocked.

But two dead bodies, a 16-year-old murder case, and the Legend of Lantern Man and The Lost Mile later, you’ll see why certain people should be minding their own beeswax. And using deadbolts.

I loved “Buzz Off,” the first in this series, and this one is even better.

Readers will want to shop at The Wild Clover, the only grocery store in town, which is Missy’s bread and (honey) butter. “When tragedy struck, my store became a hub of activity, a meeting and commiserating place. And current events certainly qualified as tragedy, two deaths at once.”

After reading this book, you’ll want to go to a local farmers’ market and buy beeswax candles, (which never go bad, by the way), and invent recipes incorporating honey products.

But, like me, I’m sure some readers will identify with the reluctant Holly, “who was afraid of honey bees and would rather be stomped to death by wild horses than walk into an apiary. “

But that won’t stop you from grabbing this book and lapping it up page by page like a spoonful of honey.

Lisa Allmendinger is a regional reporter for AnnArbor.com. She can be reached at lisaallmendinger@annarbor.com. In addition, each Wednesday she reviews a cozy mystery in her column called “Cozy Corner.”