First in the charming Blue Ridge Library Mysteries comes
this introductory tale, setting up the characters and
locale. Amy Webber works in a Carnegie library that is now
in need of roofing and wiring but has a small-town budget. A
MURDER FOR THE BOOKS is set in Taylorford, a historic
Virginia town. Amy used to work in a university library but
felt embarrassed when her distinguished boyfriend was caught
cheating. Sadly the lady is the one who leaves in these
circumstances. Now her eyes are opened, Amy reflects that
the man was a controlling pompous type, and she decides
never to get involved with an arts man again. So when
Richard Muir, a performing artist, arrives in her library,
she's sure she's not going that direction, however
available he is.
The mystery isn't long in arriving. Richard wants to look
up local archives about a family tragedy, but in the archive
room, a library volunteer is lying dead. The elderly lady,
Doris Virts, had been wandering in her mind lately and had
taken to thinking she was being followed. By the looks of
it, maybe everyone should have believed her.
Amy demonstrates the complexities of archival research to
Richard, hunting up the owner of a brooch, and he enlists
her aid to rediscover his ancestors. This does slow down the
tale but displays the skills required of an amateur sleuth.
After Amy and her trendy assistant librarian Sunny Fields
have a run-in with Doris Virts' son, an investor in a
contentious housing project, Amy gets more involved in
tracing the killer and motive. Expect much talk of family
backgrounds and past tragedies. The action really picks up
in the later chapters, tying the tale together.
Not for the first time, I found myself thinking that a great
deal of time and money could be saved if public buildings
all had CCTV inside and out, as they do in many cities. The
same applies when a house is burgled. As more crimes pile up
in a town unaccustomed to lawbreaking, tensions rise and the
elderly feel unsafe. Amy, just in her early thirties, admits
to feeling insecure and keeps comparing the nice Richard
with her past beau. She also has body image issues and
wonders if her curvy figure is offputting. Women do tend to
ponder relationships more deeply than men. Victoria Gilbert
who was raised in the Blue Ridge Mountains has qualified in
arts and library science, providing the expertise needed to
write this excellent mystery A MURDER FOR THE BOOKS. While a
lot of the tale does relate to books and records, we spend
time outdoors in the natural environment too.
Fleeing a disastrous love affair, university librarian
Amy Webber moves in with her aunt in a quiet, historic
mountain town in Virginia. She quickly busies herself
with managing a charming public library that requires all
her attention with its severe lack of funds and
overabundance of eccentric patrons. The last thing she
needs is a new, available neighbor whose charm lures her
into trouble.
Dancer-turned-teacher and choreographer Richard Muir
inherited the farmhouse next door from his great-uncle,
Paul Dassin. But town folklore claims the house’s
original owner was poisoned by his wife, who was an
outsider. It quickly became water under the bridge, until
she vanished after her sensational 1925 murder trial.
Determined to clear the name of the woman his great-uncle
loved, Richard implores Amy to help him investigate the
case. Amy is skeptical until their research raises
questions about the culpability of the town’s leading
families... including her own.
When inexplicable murders plunge the quiet town into
chaos, Amy and Richard must crack open the books to
reveal a cruel conspiracy and lay a turbulent past to
rest in A Murder for the Books, the first installment of
Victoria Gilbert’s Blue Ridge Library mysteries.
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