I'm so excited to join Berkley in celebrating the

February 6 paperback release of 

THE FAST AND THE FURRIEST

by author

Sofie Ryan

THE FAST AND THE FURRIEST

is book 5 in the Second Chance Cat Mysteries

Sarah Grayson and her trusty companion, Elvis, race to tail the right suspects in the fifth installment of the New York Times bestselling Second Chance Cat Mysteries.

Sarah Grayson owns Second Chance, a shop that sells lovingly refurbished items, in the charming town of North Harbor, Maine. But she couldn't run the store without the help of her right-hand man, Mac--or her dashing rescue cat, Elvis.

Mac's life before North Harbor has always been a little bit mysterious, but it becomes a lot more intriguing when a woman from his past shows up in town, and then turns up dead. Suspicion falls on Mac, but Sarah--and Elvis--know he can't be the killer, and they hope they can prove his innocence quick as a whisker.

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A Recipe from Sofie Ryan

The characters in the Second Chance Cat mysteries like to eat. Although Sarah is still working on her cooking skills, Rose Jackson is a talented cook and thanks to her there’s always something sweet in the break room at the library. My own mother didn’t like to cook. But she had a good friend, Mrs. V., who did, and who encouraged my early baking efforts. This is about as close as I’ve been able to come to her molasses oatmeal cookie recipe, adapted from a recipe in an old Betty Crocker cookbook.

Mrs. V.’s Molasses Oatmeal Cookies

Ingredients

1 cup sugar

1/2 cup butter or margarine, softened

1/3 cup molasses

2 eggs

2 cups quick-cooking oats

1 2/3 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/4 cup raisins*

Heat oven to 375°F. In large bowl, whisk together sugar, butter, molasses and eggs until smooth and creamy. Stir in remaining ingredients except raisins until well blended. Drop dough by rounded spoonfuls about 2 inches apart onto cookie sheets lined with parchment. (Batter will spread as they bake.)

Bake 10 to 12 minutes or just until set. Cool for one to two minutes; remove from cookie sheets to a rack.

This makes between 36 and 42 dark, chewy cookies. What can I say? I never seem to make tiny cookies. These are about two and a half inches in diameter.

*Note: I have some people in my house who don’t like raisins in their molasses cookies. (That makes no sense to me.) So I bake half the cookies, and then add raisins to the remaining batter.

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About Sofie

 I’m married with one teenage daughter. We live on the east coast less than two hours drive from the ocean. I like living somewhere with all four seasons, although there are times in the middle of January that living on a Caribbean island starts to sound like fun.

I have a degree in Biology as well as an Education degree. I honed my research skills working on my Biology degree. My Statistics professor really emphasized asking lots of questions about any piece of information. And I had a Molecular Biology prof who believed we learn more from our mistakes than our successes—which was good because my lab partner had a habit of setting our experiments on fire.

 I love cats. I like their independent spirit. I don't have one because my husband is extremely allergic to them. (If he dies first I'm getting a cat. People laugh when I say that because they think I'm kidding.) Even though I don’t have a cat myself, I do have “cat friends”—cats in my neighborhood that I spend time with so I can get my kitty fix.

www.sofieryan.com

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