A Killing in Antiques

A Lucy St. Elmo Antiques Mystery

By Mary Moody

Paperback, 130 pages, $6.99

The first in a new series, ‘A Killing in Antiques” by Mary Moody will make you want get up really, really early and stand in line to visit the Brimfield Antique and Collectibles Shows in Massachusetts.

“Brimfield appears like Brigadoon. Suddenly, in a magic moment on an appointed day, it’s there.”

Actually, it’s there three times a year, with hundreds of tents arranged into streets and alleys in a “higgledy-piggledy imitation of city blocks,” on uneven fields. It’s worth a trip — even if you only go once to say you’ve been there.

Or, you can just live the experience vicariously by kicking back in a hammock with a glass of lemonade and flying through this terrifically-plotted, keep-you-guessing until the cozy end novel.

Each tent is an individual antique shop, or, 4,000 antique shops that will be scoured by 50,000 or so buyers. Lucy and her friends spend the days renewing old friendship and hunting treasures to sell in their own shops at home.

But before daybreak on day one, there’s a murder of a fellow dealer/picker, Monty Rondo, and Lucy feels compelled to find out whodunit — between shopping trips, of course, with Supercart in tow. She’s known Monty and his sidekick Silent Billy, so named for the obvious, for years. She knows he’s incapable of murder, but the local police don’t.

So, between purchases and trips back to her van with her treasures, Lucy thinks and asks questions. She follows clues, and you grow to understand, know and like her.

Lucy's a likeable small business owner in a neat profession.

‘A Killing In Antiques’ is all the good stuff cozy readers want in a terrific debut.

If you’d like to be a mouse in the corner for the largest antique show in the Northeast with Lucy and friends as your guide, grab this book and enjoy the trip. This is a terrific kick off to what I hope will be a long-lived series.

You’ll fall in love with Lucy (and friends) as they hunt for treasure and clues.

“I hate to talk on the phone, I don’t like telephones, I don’t like being connected to another person by a device that’s smarter than I am… and phones are like dogs — they can tell when you don’t like them.”

I can relate completely.

Lisa Allmendinger is a regional reporter for AnnArbor.com. She can be reached at lisaallmendinger@annarbor.com. In addition, each Wednesday she reviews a cozy mystery in her column called “Cozy Corner.”