A BAT IN THE BELFRY is part of the Home Repair is Homicide series, which is set in coastal Maine. A teenaged girl climbs a derelict bell tower at night for a bet, and someone hiding at the top kills her. The townsfolk are astonished to hear the bell ringing after many years, and the police hurry to investigate. Jacobia Tiptree, known as Jake, moved to Moose Island to escape an ex-husband - who promptly followed her - and ever since has been repairing a fixer- upper house and helping to solve murders. But maybe this case is beyond her skills.

A BAT IN THE BELFRY provides handy tips like, hold tiny nails steady with a needle-nose pliers while tapping them in. It's hard to understand why exactly a divorcee with a young son bought a three-story and attic house with forty- eight windows, in need of much work. The heating bills alone must be enormous. But by now Jake has made progress, remarried, and her son, in his twenties, has a friend called Chip to visit for a few days. Chip is a researcher while his girlfriend writes up crime, and Chip happens to be out for a walk at night when the old bell is heard ringing. Lizzie Snow who has just arrived on the island is looking for a missing child, and she tells police that Chip was at the crime scene. Conflicted between helping the police and protecting her guest, Jake just has to get involved, against her better judgement.

Like all the fictional small towns with soaring murder rates, everyone knows everyone in the Moose Island community and where hunting and fishing are part of getting the groceries, weapons abound. In this tale by Sarah Graves a weather alert is issued and a storm rolls off the sea, replacing the usual fog, with spray surging over the harbour walls as hail pelts Jake while the wind buffets her sideways. Between the weather and the large cast of characters, most of whom are new to the scene, there is plenty to occupy the reader. Jake also has a plumbing emergency to keep her on her toes, and it's possible that a colony of carpenter ants are making the bell tower weak enough to collapse in the gale. But that's all part of the fun. And we get told that a sticking wooden window sash will move easily if the channel is sprayed with furniture polish.

A BAT IN THE BELFRY is not so cosy as some crime novels, more amateur sleuth and with plentiful location detail to interest even the most jaded reader.