A Call for Kelp

A Call for Kelp is the fourth book in Bree Baker's Seaside Café Mystery series, published in 2020 and set in the island town of Charm, North Carolina.

Everly Swan runs Sun, Sand, and Tea, an iced-tea café in the seaside house she inherited. When a famous Hollywood actress arrives in town to work on a beekeeping documentary and is found dead of a bee sting — despite an allergy severe enough that she took every precaution against exactly that — the death is plainly no accident. The finger points at the father of Everly's best friend, and Everly starts investigating to clear him.

She is quickly warned off, which only confirms she is looking in the right place. Alongside the mystery, the book continues the slow-burn tension between Everly and Detective Grady Hays. It is a beachfront cozy: a busy amateur sleuth, a town full of people with reasons to lie, and a resolution reached without graphic violence on the page.