Jacobia (Jake) Tiptree and her best friend, Ellie, are new
real estate owners in their town of Eastport, Maine.
They're thrilled when tenants decide to move into the fixer-
upper on Long Cove Road, even if they are a coven of
witches and a barely verbal teenage girl. The only
problems, at first, are a few calls from the renters about
electrical problems and a leaky faucet.
When the body of Eugene Dibble is found in the shed behind
Jake and Ellie's house, the local cops suspect he was
murdered for a batch of oxycontin pills in a spat between
two partners. But why would the murderer have come back for
the mute girl, Wanda Cathart?
As Jake investigates, she's drawn into an increasingly
miasmic situation -- was Mac Rickert, the local mountain
man, Dibble's partner? If so, why did he kidnap Wanda? What
do the current tenants have to hide, and why is Greg Brand
so jumpy when questioned?
This is an easy read and a really fun cozy mystery. I could
relate to the fact that Jake has a nickname, has been
previously married and has a son by that marriage, is into
guns and home repair, and continuously gets into scary
situations. The story line is solid, while not
oversimplified. NAIL BITER is a good, well-written book.
Jacobia “Jake” Tiptree took the dangerous plunge from Wall
Street power broker–to homeowner! Now the do-it-yourself
enthusiast is about to discover that her own dream house is
built on a foundation of murder.
Buying a beachfront
fixer-upper to lease out to Eastport, Maine’s, burgeoning
tourist crowd seems like a good idea to Jake Tiptree and her
best friend, Ellie White. But working double-time as
landladies to a coven of wannabe witches isn’t what they had
in mind. And it only gets worse when Jake is called out one
stormy night to make a repair–and stumbles on a dead body in
the utility shed.
A small-time thief and street
preacher with a particularly violent message, the deceased
was no favorite of Jake’s–nor of anyone else in Eastport.
But what’s he doing shot to death on Jake’s property?
Jake’s bewitching tenants–including an ex-cop, a con man,
and a mute teenage girl–claim to have been too busy
conjuring spells to have heard or seen a thing. Then a
member of the coven disappears without a trace and Jake
doesn’t think it’s a case of witchcraft–but a
kidnapping...or worse.
Scandal, secrets, and a
mysterious box buried deep in the foundation of her own home
are just the beginning of a mystery that threatens to bring
Jake’s house–and life–crashing down. Now she and Ellie are
racing to find a missing girl who may be the key to it
all...or lead them to a killer holding the final nails to
their coffins.