Madeline Brimley, after a moderately successful acting career, has left the stage and now manages a bookshop in the town of Enigma, Georgia. In the second of the series, she finds a cold case closer to home than anyone would like. ALL MY BONES looks at small- town sorrows, wealth contrasts, and modern life imposing on a community largely made up of seniors.

With her friend Gloria Coleman, the local Episcopal priest who had a chequered past, Madeline starts replanting the front garden of the fine house where she lives and sells books. Fittingly, the Aunt Rose from whom she recently inherited the store had created a new rose variety, and Madeline would like to plant some in the front garden. But the ladies have hardly broken the surface when they start uncovering bones. Who is missing locally? Well, nobody has been reported missing. But before long, whispers name Beatrice Glassie, a crotchety lady who travelled and hasn’t been seen for half a year. Not that anyone is counting, especially not her estranged sister. Idell Glassie becomes irate and blames the conveniently deceased Rose for the death, or else Reverend Gloria Coleman, but Madeline decides that Idell blames herself for not realising that her sister was away too long.

The allusion of the title to a Grimm’s Fairy Tale called The Juniper Tree is more than apt, because not only were bones buried to cover up a death, but in circulation is a rare first edition of Grimm's Fairy Tales. The Old Juniper Bookstore Mysteries incorporate literary references and lines from various plays, with Madeline revisiting her theatrical past occasionally. The downside of this lovely idea is that not much of actual evidence is found, discussed or preserved. Investigating is based largely on conversations, the suspect list is slight – full of individual characters, though – and law enforcement is mainly occupied in telling Madeline not to get involved, in triplicate.

P.J. Nelson has previously been an actor and professor, and his choice of setting brings people in those roles to meet at an atmospheric bookshop. ALL MY BONES looks at small towns in the South – perhaps anywhere – and asks what became of women who didn’t marry, and what their lives are like today as seniors. Generally, the answers aren’t pleasing. On the other hand, these are the people who don’t buy books and goods online, so they support the local businesses. I can tell the author’s male - what woman would eat cold chicken fried rice from a carton, as Madeline does, presuming there was a microwave in the kitchen? And if there wasn’t, she would buy one.