Mystery Books - Page 12

A Vase of Mistaken Identity (Thea James Mystery Series, Book 1)

Cathy Elliott

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 15 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Terrific in every way 5 out of 5 stars.
3 of 3 people found this review helpful.

This is a great story with memorable characters, a great sense of place, and a likeable main character, Thea James. The mystery finds Thea as she is recovering from a great personal loss and struggling along her faith journey. Unlike many mysteries, how Thea comes to be involved, how the events unfold, and the ultimate resolution are really plausible and don't seem contrived. I loved Thea's strength, chuckled at her clumsiness, and groaned at her puns. This is a book that you won't be able to put down. You'll want to see how it ends and you'll hate that it's ending all at the same time. I hope Cathy Elliott writes another book soon!

A Fun Read 5 out of 5 stars.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful.

I don't generally read mysteries (real life is scary enough for me), but A Vase of Mistaken Identity was truly a fun read. The characters are quirky, yet real enough to identify with, the dialogue was natural, and there was just the right amount of suspense to keep me reading without wanting turn on all the lights and lock my door. Cathy Elliott's debut novel has made me a fan of "cozy mysteries" and I can't wait to read more of Thea & Co.

Editorial Review:

When Thea James discovers a puzzling list inside a vintage vase, she finds four names on the list . . . including her own! Follow this small-town antique dealer as she becomes a relentless detective on the trail of a killer in this page-turner mystery. Guaranteed fiction! (20061102)

Her Only Protector (Cradle of Secrets Series #2) (Steeple Hill Love Inspired Suspense #113)

Lisa Mondello

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Editorial Review:

A perilous journey to South America is the only way to retrieve the child. With her missing brother's daughter back in her arms, Sonny Montgomery finally feels safe. Until a handsome, cold-eyed bounty hunter stops her moments before boarding a plane to the U.S.

Gil Waite is after her brother. All he cares about is “finding the fugitive” and collecting his money. Sonny won't betray her family. Yet she has no choice but to go with Gil. A man whose rugged exterior hides the heart of a hero.

A Matter of Wife & Death (Secrets from Lulu's Cafe Series #2)

Ginger Kolbaba, Christy Scannell

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 4 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

LIFE IS SOMETIMES MESSY...

especially when people expect you to be perfect.

Jennifer, who volunteers at a crisis pregnancy center, has waited years for a baby. Why is it so easy for girls like Jessica to get pregnant -- and so hard for her? Is it possible to want a baby too much?

Lisa's teenage daughter, Callie, is giving her the silent treatment. And her attitude at church -- when she goes -- majorly stinks. The board already criticizes her husband's ministry. What will they say now?

Mimi is overwhelmed. Baby Milo cries continually until she's so tired she can't see straight. Will anybody ever see her for her -- not just as a mom and a house slave?

Felicia's four-year-old, Nicholas, is biting people again. And the timing couldn't be worse...especially when Felicia's boss is about to close her Cincinnati PR office.

Then there's the snobby Katherine Katt, who's determined to lord it over them all....

A WORD FROM THE WIVES...

Mimi thought of her kids -- especially her second child, MJ. If she instituted a naughty corner, he'd basically end up living there. She could set up a small cot and etch the words MJ's Naughty Corner right into the wall. "If we could only have a naughty corner for ornery church members..." Jennifer said with a mischievous smile. -- Mimi

"Sometimes I look at my family and at the ministry and wonder if the sacrifice is too great. We're doing all this for God's kingdom...but, in the process, losing our daughter. Is it worth it? Is this really what God had in mind? I don't know." -- Lisa

"You listen to me, Kitty. If you tell Sam that secret, I'll tell Norm your secret!" -- Jennifer

"Hey, how tough can being a stay-at-home mom be, really? I ran a public relations office; I'm used to challenges. This should be a piece of cake." -- Felicia

Full Circle

Davis Bunn

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 2 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

A Story of Hope and Forgiveness 4 out of 5 stars.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful.

American Adam Wright travels to Oxford, England at the request of his dying mother and a man he's met once. Adam needs a job; the company for which he hopes to work needs a miracle.

Kayla Austin returns from Africa, humiliated, with a shattered heart and a shattered dream.

This is by no means Bunn's most original or suspenseful novel; but he does a great job with the formula, demonstrating once again his enviable ablility to write different styles. His characters are well-rounded and sympathetic, and his mystery intriguing and credible. Peter, Honor, and others bring meaningful faith to the narrative without preaching. Davis Bunn has lived all over the world, but set this story in his own town of Oxford, making it very natural and rather special.

It's a good, fairly quick read with just enough suspense to keep the pages turning. I never doubted the happy ending, but most definitely enjoyed the trip. Keep up the good work, Mr. Bunn!

Editorial Review:

Sometimes to find what matters, you have to back up and start again.

He's a hotshot financial analyst who has lost it all. She's a brokenhearted world traveler forced to come home and beg for money. His job hangs by a thread. Her dreams of making a difference in Africa are circling the drain.

It's a spectacularly bad time for romance, even on the charming stone streets of an English university town. But sparks fly--and danger threatens--when these two wounded souls must work together to solve a mystery and right a wrong.

To find what they need, they may need to relearn everything they thought they knew about love.

Dark Pursuit

Brandilyn Collins

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A new stand-alone “Seatbelt Suspense™” from bestselling author Brandilyn Collins.
Kaitlan Sering’s estranged grandfather, novelist Darell Brooke, was the legendary King of Suspense—until an auto accident left him unable to concentrate. Now she’s begging him to protect her from a real serial killer. Can his muddled mind devise a plan to catch the murderer?

Nicolae: The Rise of Antichrist (Left Behind, Book 3)

Tim LaHaye, Jerry B. Jenkins

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 376 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

Antichrist. The very word send shivers through us. And Nicolae Carpathia certainly does not disappoint as Antichrist. Nicolae is the third book in Left Behind series written by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins, and is preceded by book one, Left Behind, and book two, Tribulation Force.

Nicolae Carpathia becomes the focus as he continues to consolidate his power, unifying political states ("Global Community"), media ("Global Community Network," "Global Weekly"), and religions ("Enigma Babylon One World Faith") under a Nicolae-appointed supreme pontiff. Nicolae himself is grand potentate of the global community.

Our heroes, pilot Rayford Steele and journalist Buck Williams, along with the rest of the Tribulation Force, continue their struggle to survive and protect their families in the midst of global war and destruction. They have come to recognize Nicolae Carpathia to be the Antichrist prophesied in the Bible, and to them it comes as no great revelation that this man, who presented himself as a charming and benevolent leader, has been unmasked as a ruthless and cruel tyrant, manipulating people and events to serve his own ends. And his ends are undoubtedly evil.

It becomes apparent that the chaos and turmoil created by Nicolae are the fulfillment of John's prophesy of the seven seals as recorded in the book of Revelation. And it becomes also apparent they are now facing the sixth seal, a great earthquake which is sometimes called "the wrath of the lamb." This upheaval of the earth, with its accompanying death and destruction, is familiar apocalyptic imagery: a blood-red moon, a sun turned black, and the stars falling from the sky. And the Tribulation Force discovers that these incredible descriptions turn out to be not so very far from the truth.

Who survives? How? What does Nicolae have in mind for the world? Readers of the first two books should not be disappointed with this third installment to this chilling tale.

The Guardian's Mission (The Sinclair Brothers Trilogy, Book 1) (Steeple Hill Love Inspired Suspense #111)

Shirlee McCoy

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Editorial Review:

"Ma'am, I'm not one of the bad guys."

So says the handsome man Martha Gabler encounters near her isolated mountain cabin. Tristan Sinclair claims he's an ATF agent working undercover. And that if she doesn't play along as his unexpected girlfriend, they'll both end up dead. Nursing a broken heart, Martha knows a thing or two about love that isn't real. Still, she calls up all her faith and turns her shaky trust over to Tristan. Soon she's hoping he'll take on a new mission: guarding her for the rest of her life.

Don't Take Any Wooden Nickels (The Million Dollar Mysteries, Book 2)

Mindy Starns Clark

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 10 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Take This Book for a Great Read 5 out of 5 stars.
2 of 3 people found this review helpful.

When Callie Webber is in her home town on the Chesapeake, she volunteers with Advancing Attire, a non-profit that helps poor women get started in office jobs, mainly by providing appropriate clothes. Callie's latest client is Shayna. When Shayna calls that afternoon, she's upset because her boyfriend, Eddie, is missing. When they do find Eddie, he's dead in the trunk of Shayna's car. Now Callie's unexpected week off has become quite full. With the police naturally focusing their attention on Shayna, Callie must find evidence that proves this young woman is innocent. When she does find something, it leads her to something she never would have imagined, and more danger then she can handle alone. Meanwhile, Callie is also investigating a national non-profit that claims it will help Advancing Attire expand its office space. And she' trying to deal with disappointment from not getting to meet her mysterious boss, Tom.

Like the first book, this one starts slow. It steadily gains speed and by the climax, it's impossible to put down. Even before then, the writing style draws the reader in and makes it easy to get caught up in the story and sub-plots. Callie really grows in this book as she is forced to face the isolation she's placed herself in after the death of her husband. And, while I saw the final scene coming long before I got there, I couldn't help but smile as I read it.

I am quite taken with this series and will be reading book three as soon as I can get my hands on it.

Editorial Review:

With a touch of romance and a strong heroine, Don’t Take Any Wooden Nickels offers more of the fast–paced and suspenseful inspirational writing readers found in A Penny for Your Thoughts.

Working to provide quality work clothes to women who can’t afford to buy their own, Callie becomes involved with one young woman trying to come out of drug rehabilitation—just as she’s charged with murder.

What appears to be a routine murder investigation in her sleepy waterside village suddenly becomes complicated amid international intrigue, cutting–edge technology, and deadly deception. In a desperate moment at what could be the end of her life, Callie cries out to the God who is as close as a whispered prayer.

Eyes of Elisha (Chelsea Adams Series #1)

Brandilyn Collins

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 28 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

A great thriller that suffers from being too long 3 out of 5 stars.
4 of 5 people found this review helpful.

EYES OF ELISHA is an in-depth Christian legal thriller by Brandylin Collins. The book opens with a young woman being murdered while jogging in the park. Later, Chelsea Adams and her husband Paul are having a business dinner with Gavil Norwood. Chelsea has a vision from God (she's a new Christian and has had a few visions already) that shows the woman being murdered. Chelsea believes God is telling her that Gavil Norwood is the murderer. No spoiler here, you find all this out in the first few pages of this novel. Chelsea debates what to do with her vision. She finally goes to the cops and tells them her vision. They don't believe her so she goes to the park and, on her own, finds the victim's body.

From this point, the plot follows a predictable path. The cops investigate Norwood, who claims to be innocent. Evidence is found, Norwood acts like a guilty party, then the trial begins. Meanwhile, Chelsea's family has doubts about her new faith and soon Chelsea begins to doubt her own vision. The trial portion of the novel is very good, very indepth and exciting.

I've read Collins last two Kanner Lake books VIOLET DAWN and CORAL MOON. These novels were great, and were also a quick read. I don't know word counts, but EYES OF ELISHA seems like it is twice as long as those novels. This novel is definitely too long, especially since it seems like all the major plot players and possibilities are introduced at the beginning of the novel. Of course, all is not as it seems, and there are several twists and turns. Unfortunately, it seems like that for 200 pages, the novel is going in one direction and has no chance of deviating from that path. Without going into spoilers, I can't really say anymore than that. I thought the book had a satisfying ending and payoff, but don't know if I'll check out the sequel to this novel. I urge readers considering books by this author to try VIOLET DAWN first.

Editorial Review:

Chelsea Adams has a vision in which she sees the death of a young woman. When she comes back to consciousness after that vision, she looks into the eyes of a dinner guest and experiences a terrifying moment of recognition. She s certain that he is the murderer of the young woman in her vision. Plenty of twists and turns of plot right up until the end of this edge-of-your-seat thriller.

Dead of Night (Hidden Faces Series #3)

Brandilyn Collins

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 39 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Read with your lights on! 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

Annie Kingston has once again been called to use her forensics drawing expertise in another case. This time a serial killer is targeting her home town. The killings though are took close for Annie and her family. There's pressure to find out who the killer is. Annie herself is not sure as there is limited evidence. Plus she is worried about her teenage son and the rebellious stage he is going through. Evil and wickedness are rampant in this town and the prayers of its citizens are needed to help them survive.

I've also read the first two books in this series, but I'm going to review this one first. Why? Because it was one of the best suspense books I have read this year. I was seriously creeped out while reading this book. I won't lie though. The first two books in the series while very good just didn't keep me up late at night because I was afraid to sleep. But this book however, wow. I wanted to keep the lights on! What's interesting is that there is absolutely no hint of who the actual killer is throughout the whole book. While the killer does have scenes before they are finally revealed, there is no indication at all that points evidence towards them. When I found out who it was, I flipped back trying to figure out when this character first appears but it seemed like they had always been there in the background. Reading the killer's monologues in between characters was like listening to nails on a chalkboard. You get so uncomfortable and irritated and want to scream. The thinking is so twisted and evil that it's deliciously scary. The final battle between the killer and Annie was bite on your nails, cover your eyes, hide beneath the covers all out suspense. The only minor complaint I had was that the killer never says to Annie why they did what they did and that we don't find out what happens to them. But I'm actually rather glad this wasn't written. I hate "last chapter confessions" because it is so unreal that the killer wants to divulge everything before they get caught. Seriously, now I know why Brandilynn's tag line is "Don't Forget to Breathe." This book totally took my breath away.

Editorial Review:

The Redding, California, area is terrorized by a serial killer with an unusual method for murder. Annie Kingston is called in to draw sketches of the victims' faces so they can be identified. As the body count rises, the pressure increases to find this heinous killer. The Sheriff thinks he's close--maybe too close. How can Annie—and her son— stay safe, as the killer closes in? Book Three in the Hidden Faces Series.