Death on Tap

Set in Leavenworth, Wash., a neo-Bavarian craft beer paradise, this hopped-up series launch from Alexander (A Crime of Passion Fruit and five other Bakeshop mysteries) introduces gifted beer brewer Sloan Krause. When Sloan catches her husband, Mac, in flagrante with the barmaid at the Krause family’s venerable microbrewery, Das Keller, Sloan leaves Mac and takes a job at Nitro, a competing brewery. There she discovers brewmaster Eddie Deluga, “bloated with beer and death” in a brewing tank. The local police chief arrests Mac for Eddie’s murder. For the sake of their teenage son and Mac’s terrific parents and brother, Sloan must save her low-life cheating husband by sussing out the real killer. Meanwhile, the chemistry cooks between Sloan and handsome Garrett Strong, Nitro’s owner. Alexander provides everything you want to know about brewing, maybe more, including the temperature for storing hops and reasons to filter. Readers will enjoy descriptions of Sloan’s IPA cupcakes and chocolate stout brownies; many will wish the recipes weren’t a mystery. (Oct.)