Someone burned Hester's house down. She's going to find them them and when she does, she's going to burn their house down. An eye for an eye. That's what life's about, decides Hester. She's made three New Year resolutions give up swearing, give up asking rhetorical questions, give up sex. She's discovered how to set fire to a house without being caught, organised a get out of town plan, everything's set on go. Then her mother dies, her best friend begs Hester to do the one thing she's sworn never to do again - direct a play with teenagers - and her sister, off on a holiday on some Pacific Island, says she can't change her plans so Hester will have to clean their mother's house and get it ready for sale. To make matters worse ex-Senior Sergeant, ex-friend, Auden Porohiwi is very interested in Hester's plans does he know who the arsonist was? Is he protecting someone? Does he know what Hester's planning? Who cares, thinks Hester, it's now or never. So its now.
In Too Many Cooks, Renée's trademark humour, acute sense of the absurd, her insight into the many and various impulses that make people tick, produces a funny, touching and enthralling story of love, desire and revenge that goes very wrong before it comes right.