Leave it to a newcomer to have suspicions a suicide is actually something more sinister.

Rose Franklin has ditched her cheating husband, packed up their travel trailer, and taken off to Arizona…only to find her car broken down in West Memphis, Arkansas. Forced to take a detour from her trip, she parks her camper at the Shady Grove Campground on the banks of the Mississippi. A prettier, more serene setting could not be found, but Rose happens to arrive on the day the sheriff fishes the body of the local undertaker, Lawrence Franklin, from the river.

The sheriff is acting weird, and the residents think this is nothing more than what it seems. It’s when Rose falls for the undertaker’s best friend – Tom Sawyer – that she is drawn into the mystery surrounding Franklin’s death.

This novel is more a study on spirituality and Rose’s journey to self-discovery than a traditional mystery. It’s more a version of deep, “thoughtful” chicklit than a cozy, as if the writer could not make up her mind as to which genre she is appealing to. Adding to the confusion is the pseudo prose surrounding Rose’s ponderings on her mother. It’s unnecessary literary gilding, and annoying. This is a murder mystery, not a sonnet.

Or maybe I’m following the wrong premise, and asking too much. I expect mystery when it says “A Shady Grove Mystery” on the front of the jacket. Or maybe that is the mystery in the first place -- confusing the reader.

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Publisher: St. Martin's Minotaur
June 5, 2006
ISBN: 0312352301
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