Lana Lee runs her family’s noodle restaurant Ho-Lee Noodle House, and she thought it would be a good idea to expand into catering. Their first job is to provide the food for Donna Feng’s party. While her teenaged daughters are upstairs with their friends and nanny, the adults are downstairs enjoying the delicious food, some drinks, and the DJ. Donna and her Cleveland society friends are having a great time. But when the nanny turns up floating in the pool, the gossip quickly turns against Donna.

Lana is heart-broken when the party-goers seem to think that Donna could have hurt anyone, much less killed them, and decides to try to figure out who at the party could have killed the nanny. And then, when a thumb drive with Donna’s secrets shows up in her house, Lana wonders if someone had been trying to blackmail the woman and if the nanny had been tied to the blackmail attempt.

As Lana and her friends try to figure out who might have motive to blackmail Donna, and who would have access to those secrets, she finds herself going in circles with Donna’s friends, trying to separate the gossip from the truth and hoping to find a motive somewhere on that party guest list. But then a fire at Donna’s house puts her and her daughters in even more danger, and Lana knows that she needs to put together the pieces even more quickly if she’s going to keep Donna, her family, and her secrets safe.

Egg Drop Dead is the latest in the Noodle Shop Mystery series. Author Vivien Chien writes fun cozies set in Cleveland’s Asian community. The characters are lots of fun, the mysteries are interesting, and the writing is compelling. This is the fifth in the series, and the more you read, the more these characters come to life and feel like old friends. Egg Drop Dead is pure fun that leaves you hungry for more!

Egalleys for Egg Drop Dead were provided by St. Martin’s Paperbacks through NetGalley, with many thanks.