A Killing at Cotton Hill
A Samuel Craddock Mystery
Terry Shames
Seventh Street Books, July 2013
ISBN 978-1-61614-799-0
Trade Paperback
Retired police chief Samuel Craddock is forced to step in when his friend Dora Lee Parjeter is murdered. Rodell, the present police chief of the small Texas town isn’t good for much except drinking and womanizing–mostly with the wrong woman–and is fond of taking the easy way out. In this case, he arrests the dead woman’s grandson, Greg, who lives on the farm with her. Why? Because he’s there. The evidence, let alone any kind of motive, is lacking.
Samuel is still working through the loss of his dearly beloved wife, and finally taking an interest in outside things. This includes a casual friendship with Loretta, and a renewed passion for art. While trying not to let Rodell know what he’s up to, when he begins investigating Dora Lee’s death, he soon discovers her grandson is an extremely talented artist. It’s this talent, in part, that makes Samuel decide to take the case on. During the investigation, he becomes friends with attorney Jenny Sandstone, whom I feel certain we’ll see more of in the next Samuel Craddock mystery.
Samuel’s investigation places him right in the murderer’s headlights. His house, and his art collection, amassed with his dead wife, is nearly destroyed via an arsonist’s fire. Instead of discouraging the former policeman, the damage only makes him more determined to find the killer.
The plot moves right along. We get to know Samuel as a determined, dutiful man who isn’t quite ready to hang up his lawman’s hat, after all. All the characters are well-drawn, both the small-town folks, and the potential killers. A fine line to walk, that author Terry Shames manages very well indeed.
Reviewed by Carol Crigger, October 2013.
Author of Three Seconds to Thunder.
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Live and Let Fly
Karina L. Fabian
MuseItUp Publishing, April 2012
Ebook
Vern wasn’t your ordinary PI. For a start he was a dragon…and has a nun for a sidekick…and he lives in Los Lagos, Colorado. These days, he tries to solve crime rather than eating optimistic knights who really should have known better. But something’s come up. There’s a damsel in distress, a cataclysmic disaster about to unfold and Vern and Sister Grace are the only ones who can stop it. Will they save the world and prevent the next Ragnarok? Will they rescue the damsel and make it out alive? And most importantly, who’s going to sign off on their expenses?
I confess that the idea of a dragon being a successful PI is not an idea I thought I would have readily accepted. I was even more sceptical when I continually heard Vern talking like Jimmy Stewart in a ‘now look here see?’ kind of way. It reads like the old film noir classics where characters explained themselves to the camera and jazz music plinked in the background. But I guess that says more about me than it does about the book.
This is a decent enough title if you’re not averse to cliché filled prose and ridiculous setups. It is essentially a crime novel with an added element of fantasy thrown in but I felt that the book was too long winded to be truly enjoyable. I found myself willing pages to turn not because I wanted to know what happened, but more to just get to the end of the thing. It felt like it took me a fortnight to read and in fact, it did take a fortnight before I got through it all. If this were heavily edited, with most of the unnecessary scenes taken out, it would make for a much faster paced title. As it is however, it rather becomes an exercise in ‘goodness, what now?’ exasperation as you lurch from one disaster to another. While there are many humorous parts and some tongue-in-cheek references to religion, the book ended up being too cumbersome for my liking. A brave effort but unfortunately, this is one title that will not survive the dragon’s gaze.
Reviewed by Laura McLaughlin, June 2013.
Buried Under Books 