Checked Out A Dead-End Job Mystery #14
Elaine Viets
Obsidian, May 2015
ISBN 978-0-451-46632-7
Hardcover
Checked Out, A Dead-End Job Mystery is number fourteen in this Elaine Viets series. I was looking forward to this book because I knew it involved a library and a missing John Singer Sargent painting. Helen Hawthorne is our hired investigator, this time volunteering in the public library to shelve books, not exactly a dead-end job but maybe I’m being too nit-picky.
There were three mysteries in the book – locating the missing painting, a robbery and a murder. Helen’s husband, Phil, handles much of the robbery on his own. The perpetrator of one of the mysteries is so obvious even our main character knows but proving it is another thing.
It is the murder mystery that is at the heart of the book, with a handful of possible perpetrators. They are easily divided into two groups: one group of likely candidates and another group of nice respectable people. Â No reveal here.
There’s a séance as well, a cat by the name of Paris lives in the library, and an extremely uncooperative police detective who antagonizes Helen. Lots to like here, I recommend it.
Reviewed by Constance Reader, July 2015.
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