"A lively, adventure filled mystery full of humor and intrigue!"
Reviewed by Sharon Galligar Chance
Posted March 18, 2012
Mystery Woman Sleuth
College librarian India Hayes thought the worst thing about
the Stripling Founders' Festival was being forced by her
sister Carmen to wear a hideous pink gingham pioneer dress
as she painted faces in one of the many booths at the
festival. India was relieved to make friends with the booth-
owner next to her, Tess Ross, a quiet but spirited basket
weaver. But peace and quiet has a wave of being disrupted
around India, and it is shattered when she discovered the
bludgeoned body of the free-spirited lady on the festival
grounds. The list of suspects is long and includes Tess's angry
blacksmith husband, her confused adopted son, her greedy
siblings and a dysfunctional artists' co-op. She also left
behind a gorgeous labradoodle dog with a two-million-dollar
trust in his name. Could that custody of the valuable pup
have been the motive for the horrible crime? Despite the wrath of her boss and protests by her handsome
police detective boyfriend, Rick Mains, India finds herself
once again playing amateur sleuth and trying to find Tess's
killer. She's also been roped into being the foster parent-
owner to the wealthy dog. With her own wacky family
contributing their two-cents worth of advice from the
sidelines and her lepracaunish landlady Ina Carroll as her
sidekick, India must discover the truth before she has a
permanent canine houseguest or ends up the next victim. In MURDER IN A BASKET, the second book in her India Hayes
Mystery series, author Amanda Flower once again takes her
readers on a lively, adventure filled mystery that is full
of humor as well as intrigue. Her heroine, India Hayes, is a
charming, personable lady librarian who finds herself in the
stickiest of situations, but she always has the love and
support of her family and friends to help her through thick
and thin. This is one series that cozy mystery fans should
keep their eyes open for.
SUMMARY
College librarian and struggling artist India Hayes isn't
sure how her older sister Carmen talked her into managing a
face-painting booth at the Stripling, Ohio, Founders' Day
Festival or how Carmen convinced her to wear the pink
gingham pioneer dress, including mobcap and granny boots,
but that's where she finds herself in a chilly October just
before Halloween. India's annoyance turns to suspicion as she discovers the
body of Zen-like basket weaver, Tess Ross, on the festival
grounds. Tess leaves behind an angry blacksmith husband, a
confused adopted son, greedy siblings, a dysfunctional
artists' co-op, and a chocolate-colored labradoodle with a
two-million-dollar trust in his name. Much to India's dismay, she learns Tess is the sister of
her stuffy college provost, Samuel Lepcheck, and the mother
of a library student worker, Derek, who has an irrepressible
crush on India that she's doing her best to ignore. Derek
begs India to investigate his mother's murder. Despite the urgings of handsome Police Detective Rick Mains
to stay out of the investigation, India agrees to Derek's
request and finds herself playing sleuth as well as
foster-owner to Zacchaeus, the two-million-dollar labradoodle. With her own eccentric family commenting from the sidelines
and her Irish-centric landlady, Ina Carroll, as volunteer
sidekick, India must discover the truth before she has a
permanent canine houseguest or she ends up the next victim
in the basket weaver's murder.
ExcerptChapter OneLate autumn is the best time to be on a college campus.
By October, the freshmen—for the most part—know
which end is up and don't have the deer-in-the-headlights
look that haunts them throughout September. The students
still appear happy to be back in school, the clean smell of
new textbooks still lingers in the air, and the promise of
extended Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays is on the
horizon.
However, that October I wasn't feeling quite as
optimistic about being on a college campus as I adjusted my
mobcap on the top of my head. I stood in front of the small
wall mirror in the tiny third floor office I shared with
Bobby McNally, my fellow Martin College reference librarian
and best friend. Sometimes I wondered how he'd earned
either title.
The door opened and Bobby stepped inside. He appraised
me with a smirk on his handsome face. His irritatingly blue
eyes slid down my body from the white mobcap on my head,
across the pink gingham dress and apron, to the black
granny boots on my feet. His grin was so large I feared he
might dislocate his jaw.
"Don't say a word," I muttered through gritted teeth. I
snapped a fanny pack, which I would use as a money belt,
around my waist with an angry click.
"Your groupie is downstairs looking for you." Bobby
walked over to his desk and turned on his laptop. Our
nineteen-seventy issue metal desks stood face to face,
creating one monster cube of beige metal and gray plastic
laminate. I noticed his files were encroaching on my
side . . . again.
"Didn't you tell him I was running a booth at the
Founders' Festival? I'm already late, and Carmen is going
to have my head." In a momentary lapse in judgment, I'd
agreed to run the face-painting booth in the Stripling
Founders' Festival, which celebrates the settling of our
fair town. This year, for the first time, the festival
would be held on the Martin College campus. It was quite a
coup to have the festival on college grounds. My sister,
Carmen, was the chair of the Founders' Festival Committee
because Carmen viewed volunteering as a duty and a full-
contact sport. Compared to my parents, however, who have
volunteered and marched for every movement that would make
flower children proud, Carmen was a minor leaguer. I, on
the other hand, tried to avoid volunteering as much as
possible.
"I thought you would want to tell him yourself," Bobby
said.
I rolled my eyes as I opened the office door. I looked
left and right. The hallway was deserted.
"Afraid of something?" Bobby's voice was in my ear,
causing me to jump.
"No," I said a little too quickly.
"He's at the reference desk. You can go down the service
elevator, and he'll never see you."
I gnawed on my lip. "Is that safe?" The service elevator
was a glorified dumbwaiter and at least seventy years old,
the same age as the library. It was tiny in comparison to
the one the library installed in the 1980s to come up to
code. We used it to send carts of books between the
building's floors. It was just big enough for one book cart
or one librarian.
"You can't weigh much more than a cart of law books.
You'll be fine."
I wasn't sure how to take that. Law books were mighty
heavy.
Bobby marched me down the hallway to the elevator. He
pressed the button and the tired machine creaked up from
the basement. When the elevator at last reached the third
floor, Bobby opened the wooden trifold door. The space was
cramped. I would have to crouch during the ride.
My courage waned. "Didn't we forbid the students from
doing this because it wasn't safe?"
"You are not a student. Martin doesn't see you as being
that valuable."
"Gee, thanks."
He gave me a little shove. "Get in." He looked me in the
eye. "Or you can go down the stairs and come face to face
with your buddy."
I hopped into the elevator.
Bobby shut the door. "See you on the other side."
I wondered what other side he meant exactly. I hoped he
wasn't referring to the afterlife.
The inside of the service elevator was dimly lit. The
ceiling was only five feet high, so I had to stoop my five-
nine frame to fit. The elevator smelled faintly of book
mold and dust. Both smells I was accustomed to in my
profession. At each floor, the ropes and pulleys jerked
slightly as if they planned to stop, and I banged my mobcap
on the ceiling with each pause in the descent. Through the
slats in the door, I could see the passage of floors. At
last, the elevator jerked to a complete stop. On the other
side of the door was the library's workroom, the private
domain of our cataloger, Jefferson Island.
Jefferson blinked when I popped out of the service
elevator. I waved before escaping out of the staff-only
exit.
Outside it was one of those rare blue-sky days, the kind
that almost make me forget I live in northeastern Ohio,
where there are only two seasons: winter and construction.
A handful of puffy cumulus clouds bobbed in the periwinkle
sky. It made me want to lie down on the grass and pick
shapes out of the clouds like I did as a child. I allowed
myself a quick peek and spotted a lion. The air was crisp;
an icy reminder that Old Man Winter wasn't too far behind
those lion-shaped clouds. I pulled my shawl more closely
around my shoulders and put my head down.
I received strange looks from students as I scurried
across campus, so I pulled my mobcap further down, hoping
to hide my face. I scolded myself for stopping at the
library before going to the practice football field where
the festival would be held. As a consequence, I had to
parade my pioneer self in front of the underclassmen, who
probably thought this was how librarians dressed every day.
Thank you very much, Hollywood, for that stereotype. I'd
gone to the library because I'd felt obligated to stop by
to check my work email—all junk and complaints, by
the way—as the college was graciously giving me free
release time to take part in the festival.
The practice field was on the opposite side of campus
just beyond fraternity row. On the walkway, I had no cause
to fear catcalls. No self-respecting frat boy would be up
at that hour.
The field was a glorified patch of grass. Martin's
sports program could not afford a real practice field and
certainly not a stadium for home games. Although Martin was
heavily endowed for a college of its size, roughly three
thousand students, the board of trustees viewed the sports
program as overindulged intramurals. They were probably
annoyed cricket wasn't on the roster and withheld funds in
protest. Much to the head football coach's humiliation, the
college rented the Stripling High School stadium for home
games.
I spotted Head Coach Lions in a heated conversation with
a woman as I crested the slight rise surrounding the
practice field. He was a medium-height muscular man with
just a hint of softening around his middle. The woman was
none other than my sister Carmen. Carmen gripped the double-
stroller handlebar in front of her with a vengeance. My
infant nieces, tethered inside the stroller, cooed to each
other, seemingly unperturbed by their mother's angry tone.
Carmen and Coach Lions weren't the only ones on the
outskirts of the field. The Stop Otter Exploitation
Commission, or SOEC, stood about ten yards away. They were
a group of animal rights activist students who felt the
college's mascot objectified otters and exploited them for
sport. Yes, the school mascot is an otter. Terrifying, I
know. They found the cartoon mascot of Otis the Otter, who
frolicked with the cheerleaders during games, especially
disturbing and demanded the college choose a non-animal to
represent its athletic teams. Lately, the group had fixated
on Coach Lions as their avenue of otter equality. They
followed him everywhere, sometimes taunting him or his
players, but in most cases they stood near him in silent
accusation. The group of six students watched the coach's
exchange with my sister with smug looks on their scruffy
faces. They appeared pleased someone else was on the
coach's case.
Behind the coach and Carmen, food vendors put the final
touches on their concession trailers and carts. My stomach
growled as I read signs for caramel apples, apple cider,
and strawberry shortcake. Beyond the food were the crafters
and artisan booths.
Within twenty feet, I could hear Carmen clearly. "You
will have this field back when I say so."
The coach crossed his arms across his broad chest,
resting their weight on his belly as if it were a shelf.
His forearms resembled Easter hams, and he looked down his
short nose at Carmen even though he was at best an inch
taller than her. Carmen was my height and looked enough
like me with her dark brown hair, strong profile, and gray
eyes to be mistaken as my twin, although she is five years
my senior.
The coach was bald. The brown skin on his head looked as
if it were polished to a high sheen on a daily basis. He
wore his sunglasses on the back of his head, giving the
illusion he had eyes back there as well. He wore them that
way no matter what the setting: practice, games, or
graduations. I'd never seen the sunglasses on his eyes even
when he was in direct sunlight.
His voice was gravelly from years of yelling from the
sidelines. "No one told us you all would be here last
night. I had to cancel practice when the guys needed it."
They would need a lot more than that, I thought, if they
planned to win a game.
"I'm sorry there was a misunderstanding. I was very
clear in my request to the college that I needed the field
for five days."
This certainly was not a discussion I wanted to join. I
started to slink away in the direction of my booth, which I
had constructed the evening before, but I was too slow.
"India!" Carmen's harried, mother-hen voice assaulted my
ears.
Against my better judgment, I turned.
She crooked a finger at me. I shook my head left and
right. Her eyes narrowed, and I walked over.
What do you think about this review?
Comments
No comments posted.
Registered users may leave comments.
Log in or register now!
|
© 2003-2024 off-the-edge.net
all rights reserved Privacy Policy