Mystery Lovers' Kitchen: Spotlight on Cleo Coyle

Sunday, April 27, 2025

HOW WRITER'S BLOCK INSPIRED OUR NEW MYSTERY by Cleo Coyle + Book & Tote #Giveaway #Spotlight

Once a month, each of us here at Mystery Lovers' Kitchen takes a turn stepping into the spotlight. This month is our turn, and Marc and I decided to shine a little of that light onto our creative process.

Nearly every writer stalls, panics, and wrestles with self-doubt at one time or another. But here’s the question of the day. Can a writer’s struggles lead to a deadly end? Reverse the words writer’s block to blocked writer—as in thwarted, stymied, stonewalled—and you may have an even stronger motive for murder. At least, that’s what my husband and I pondered as we set out to pen our latest murder mystery.

Cleo Coyle writes two
bestselling mystery

series with her husband.
To learn more, click here.

Ironically, though the thought of the dreaded "writer’s block" has sent fear into the hearts of many a scribe, that same literary affliction has also propelled entertaining plotlines in novels and films. There’s The Shining, of course; more recently The Plot; and the Nicolas Cage film Adaptation to name a few. In all of those stories writer's block eventually led to murder, and we were similarly inspired as we sat down to write.

Given our looming deadline, we stared at blank screens for a time and then—EUREKA!—our stalled progress itself became the inspiration...

The idea of writer’s block felt perfect for our Coffeehouse Mystery series. After all, coffee itself is known as "writer’s fuel," and the notion of writers scribbling (or procrastinating) in coffeehouses has been around about as long as there’ve been coffeehouses.

And so we were off and running, crashing through our own creative wall with the battering ram of writer’s block itself. Now the ideas were flowing. We saw our amateur sleuth—single mom and coffeehouse manager Clare Cosi—facing the devastating problem of sluggish foot traffic in her landmark Greenwich Village shop, the Village Blend...

How does Clare solve her problem? With the help of her loyal crew of baristas who suggest turning her shop’s second floor into a "Writer’s Block Lounge," something her century-old coffeehouse once embraced, only to abandon when something dark occurred. Although that history is shrouded in mystery, Clare agrees to the idea of resurrecting a space for writers. And it works. Maybe too well.

A quirky collection of creative types is soon packing both floors of Clare’s coffee shop. Unfortunately, many of these poets, playwrights, and novelists wrestle with the same demons of self-doubt, envy, and free-floating anxiety that many of us writers do, and as the pages turn in No Roast for the Weary, this stressful soup leads to murder.

Given our own two decades of experience with the exhilarating highs and gut-twisting lows of the creative process, we took to the idea of writer’s block with zeal but also empathy. Layered into our amateur sleuth’s quest for the truth behind several serious crimes (both past and present) are real and hilarious truths about the writing life, truths we know from our long experience living and working as professional writers in New York City.

Image courtesy giphy & @VirginAtlantic

Until our full-time careers as authors kicked into gear, we spent years working day jobs while writing on the side, which is why we know how crazy, inspiring, and exhausting life in the arts can be (yep, No Roast for the Weary), especially here in NYC, and we weaved some of that oddball knowledge into our newest Coffeehouse title.

At the close of our tale, we even included a short list of our favorite ways to combat writer’s block. Who knows, the tips may help inspire our fellow authors, if not prevent another deadly end. So, join us and hold on for this one. No Roast for the Weary is one heck of a caffeinated ride, and we hope you enjoy it.

CLEO COYLE is a pseudonym for Alice Alfonsi, writing in collaboration with her husband, Marc Cerasini. Both are New York Times bestselling authors of the long-running Coffeehouse Mysteries, now celebrating more than twenty years in print. With more than 1 million books sold, they have gained an enthusiastic following. Cleo's "relentlessly entertaining" (Criminal Element) novels have been translated into Spanish, Japanese, and Czech; earned starred reviews from Library Journal and Kirkus; received Best of Year selection honors from multiple reviewers; and have been recommended by Booklist as among the best culinary mysteries for core library mystery collections. Alice and Marc are also bestselling media tie-in writers who have penned properties for Lucasfilm, NBC, Fox, Disney, Imagine, Toho, and MGM. They live in New York City, where they write independently and together, including the nationally bestselling Haunted Bookshop Mysteries.

Visit Cleo's online coffeehouse here.

And follow Cleo at these links...

Facebook - Twitter - Bluesky

Instagram - Newsletter

Pinterest - Bookbub - Goodreads

National Mystery Bestseller
(Triple) #1 Amazon Category Bestseller
Fresh Fiction Readers' Selection

To Buy:

Amazon
Barnes & Noble
Bookshop.org
+ More Buy Links

"EASILY ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS THAT I HAVE READ THIS YEAR...10 STARS!" —Escape with Dollycas into a Good Book

"A KNOCKOUT STORY....one of the best books in this endearing series...a TERRIFIC READ..." —Dru Ann Love, Raven Award-winning reviewer, Dru's Book Musings

No Roast for the Weary is also a culinary mystery with a killer menu of delicious recipes. Click here or on the image below to see the free illustrated guide to our book's recipe section...

Click here or the image above for
Cleo's Free Illustrated Guide to
the recipes you'll find published in
No Roast for the Weary.

Get a free Title Checklist of
Cleo Coyle's Books in Order
Click here or on the image below.

Click here for Free
Title Checklist of Cleo Coyle's
Books in Order

👇

Cleo is now working on her
next book and Newsletter!

Don't miss her book news,
bonus recipes, and fun
prize package giveaways!

TO SIGN UP...

CLEO COYLE'S

Giveaway is now Over!

Congrats to our winner

Marcia
Bellinger!

Marcia has won...

> a signed copy of No Roast for the Weary

in its beautiful 1st edition hardcover format &

> A Coffeehouse Mystery Tote Bag &

> An autographed set of Cleo's Recipe Cards

Thanks to everyone who joining in the fun and left such kind comments!

Keep in touch, so you don't miss our next giveaway by signing up for our free newsletter

(see how below)...

👇

FOR MORE GIVEAWAY NEWS

SIGN UP FOR CLEO'S FREE...

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Sunday, May 28, 2023

Spotlight on BULLETPROOF BARISTA by @CleoCoyle + Book & Tote #Giveaway

Once a month at Mystery Lovers' Kitchen, each of us takes a turn under the heat lamp of the Kitchen spotlight. Today it's me, trying to stay cool under the circumstances because, frankly, these aren't especially comfortable to do!

Okay, so here goes...if you're new to this blog or me and my work. I'm Alice Alfonsi and I write two different mystery series under the name Cleo Coyle in collaboration with my husband, Marc Cerasini...

Above is a photo of me and Marc
posed in front of some of the earlier covers in our
long-running Coffeehouse Mystery series...

Marc and I have been partners in crime-writing for going on twenty (good grief, 20!) years. We were both born and raised in Western Pennsylvania, just outside of Pittsburgh, but we didn't meet until our adulthood (1991 actually), long after we'd moved to New York City.

When we got married in the year 2000 (at the adorable Little Church of the West), each of us had a separate, successful publishing career going.

Marc and I published many books under our own names (and I also ghostwrote), and we each hit the New York Times list with different projects. After we took a chance on getting married and living together under one roof, we decided to go for three and roll the dice on writing together, too.

We started by collaborating on a few tie-in projects, and then we decided to write a wholly original work of fiction, a mystery set in a landmark Greenwich Village coffeehouse. This "Coffeehouse" series was based on my own experiences, living in the East Village of NYC, and if you'd like to learn more about that creation and development, click here or the coffee cup below to visit our "Secret New York" site...

Anyway, our first title (published in 2003) was Coffeehouse Mystery #1 ON WHAT GROUNDS, which turned out to be a pioneering effort as a coffee-centric "urban cozy." The book was a national bestseller and the fan feedback was great, so we kept on writing, idea after idea, book after book, year after year...

During all these years of writing, we drew from our own experiences. Inspired by the strange, absurd, heroic, hilarious, and endlessly entertaining aspects of the city around us, we told the stories that we wanted to tell, in our own offbeat way. And it worked. So far, anyway. This September, we'll be celebrating the 20th anniversary of the series. We're happy about this career milestone because it will not only mark our 20th year writing mysteries together, it will also mark the publication of our 20th Coffeehouse title...

And that's why we're focusing today's

Sunday Spotlight on the cover reveal of...

Coffeehouse Mystery #20

BULLETPROOF BARISTA

(and, yes, the mystery is as much fun
as the title and cover imply)...

Coming November 2023!

To learn more or pre-order,
click a link below:

Amazon (ebook) click here

Amazon (print) click here

B&N here

Bookshop.org

+ Many More Buy Links

And finally....

As most of you know, we also write The Haunted Bookshop Mysteries. After we successfully launched the Coffeehouse series, we turned our attention to a little Rhode Island town where an earnest young widow named Penelope Thornton-McClure began to solve crimes with the help of the hardboiled (and ultimately irresistible) PI ghost she discovers haunting her bookshop.

The very first book in our Haunted Bookshop series, THE GHOST AND MRS. McCLURE was published in 2004. We followed that with four more titles, all of which were national bestsellers. Marc and I then took a ten-year hiatus, but our ghost wouldn't stop haunting us, so we returned to write more adventures in the series. Given the 2004 launch of the first book, however, looks like we'll be celebrating another 20th Year Anniversary (next year, God willing, as always) for our "Jack and Pen" Haunted Bookshop crew.

In the meantime, we're happy to share some of the lovely reviews coming in on the latest release, Haunted Bookshop #9 THE GHOST GOES TO THE DOGS. We hope you all get a chance to read it and enjoy it!

"The talented duo Alice Alfonsi and Marc Cerasini, who write under the name Cleo Coyle, continue to deliver clever, light-hearted, extremely satisfying reads in a mystery that crosses many genres. This blend of noir, paranormal, cozy, and a dash of romance sizzles with sparkling dialogue and unique plots. This is the ninth of a series that began in 2004 and still shows no sign of slowing down or losing any of its appeal."

~ Cynthia Chow, librarian and branch manager of
Kaneohe Public Library on the island of Oahu,

for Kings River Life magazine