The Great British Bump-Off

It’s been Shauna Wickle’s dream to get on the United Kingdom’s premier baking show “UK Bakery Tent” and it nearly evaporates like a poorly-thought-out reduction on her very first day.  That’s when one of the contestants, arrogant meteorologist Neal, is poisoned by an unknown party.  As producers debate whether to call this whole season off, Shauna volunteers her services as an amateur sleuth to find the real poisoner before they strike again.  The producers, not wanting to give up on this cash cow, agree and now it’s down to our protagonist and her friends, nana Jill and cool guy Sunil, to make sure this bake-off doesn’t become a bump-off.

You get no points for guessing which British-based reality show writer John Allison and artist Max Sarin are riffing on here.  However, their work here is still very enjoyable even if you’ve got no familiarity with it at all (like I do).  Shauna makes for a winningly confident and neurotic protagonist, giving both the mystery-solving and the baking her all even if she’s woefully out of her depth more often than not.  The other cast members are an entertaining gaggle of familiar character types which mix so well despite, or perhaps because of, the fact that they’ve all got one dimension to them.

The overall wackiness of the setup also allows Sarin to be gleefully unhinged in his depiction of the characters.  They mug and overemote at every chance which gives the book an undeniable energy and charm to it.  Some might find the all-out approach employed by the writer and artist to be exhausting, but I was onboard from the start.  So I’d be glad if this is the start of a new series-of-miniseries/graphic novels spotlighting Shauna’s adventures through other British-based reality shows; though, I’m still eagerly awaiting word of more “Steeple” from Allison as well.