Harumph. I deleted my original review, but here are some of the telling features that pleased me.
The heroine was my age. That is - old enough to have grown children.
The book was set in Virginia - a plus when it's well done.
Emyl Jenkins is an antiques appraiser and she begins each chapter with a question/answer about antiques which then folds into whatever happens in the upcoming pages. There's real economy and careful weaving done with this gimmick so you are glad she shared rather than irritated.
I liked the good guys and the bad'uns weren't so very evil. More like - so very human - bad humans, but just bad.
Ms. Jenkins is no novice to publishing, but this is her first foray into fiction and it shows. There is something that tells you it's a First Novel, though I can't quite put my finger on it without using words like ingénue and jejune which seem inappropriate when applied to anything a woman my age does. And yet raw is certainly not the word to use in such a gentile and gentle book. I just believe that with practice the author will ripen into something full and fun to follow, in the Mary Higgins Clarke vein.
Happily, the story concludes with enough open windows that Jenkins could be bringing us more. I certainly hope so.
It gets 4 stars, which I'll put here when I can find the code for them.
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