Genre: Mystery
Mass Market Paperback; Large Print; MP3 CD; Digital Book; Audiobook
ISBN #: 9780425236031; 1410433435; 9781522670759
Berkley Publishing
304 Pages
August 3, 2010
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Everyone in Athena, Mississippi, knows Charlie Harris, the good-natured librarian with a rescued Maine Coon cat named Diesel that he walks on a leash. He's returned to his hometown to immerse himself in books, but soon enough he's entangled in a real-life thriller...
A famous author of gory bestsellers and a former classmate of Charlie's, Godfrey Priest may be the pride of Athena, bur Charlie remembers him as an arrogant, manipulative jerk - and he's not the only one. Godfrey's homecoming as a distinguished alumnus couldn't possibly go worse: by lunch, he's put a man in the hospital. But dinner, Godfrey's dead.
Now it's up to Charlie, with some help from Diesel, to paw through the town's grudges and find the killer before an impatient deputy throws the book at the wrong person. But every last one of Charlie's friends and co-workers had a score to settle with the nasty novelist. As if the murder wasn't already purr-plexing enough...
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Charlie Harris is a college librarian in Athena, Georgia. He moved back home after his wife died and he inherited his Aunt Dottie's house. She used to take in roomers, and he continues to do so. His latest is Justin Wardlaw, who's in his first year of school and doesn't want to live in the dorms. It also helps that he went to school with Justin's mother Julia.
When Charlie hears that another old schoolmate, Godfrey Priest is coming to Athena, he's not looking forward to seeing him. Godfrey is a best-selling author, but he was a bully in school and almost everyone disliked him. So when he appears at Charlie's door, he's surprised. It seems that Godfrey wants to leave his papers to the college and is willing to donate the money for their upkeep. But then he drops a bombshell - he tells Charlie that Justin is his son and he wants to see him.
While Charlie doesn't know what to do with this information, he's nevertheless stunned when he returns home and sees Justin arguing with his dad, Ezra - the man who raised him. He's doubly upset when he sees Ezra slap Justin and tells him to leave. But after talking with Justin, he finds out he already knows about Godfrey and is prepared to talk with him.
But it's not too much later when Charlie finds Justin outside of the hotel where Godfrey is staying, and he seems to be in shock. Justin isn't making a lot of sense, so Charlie persuades him to go back to the room where Charlie finds Godfrey's body - and sees Justin's cell phone nearby.
While he doesn't believe that Justin murdered Godfrey, he wonders how the cell phone got there. Soon there's more suspects than Charlie can count, and each of them had solid motives to kill the man. But it would be easier to catalog every book in the library than find the guilty party...
While I thought this book had promise - a small town librarian with a Maine Coon cat - it didn't quite live up to its potential. For one, I wondered why Justin was living at Charlie's when he had a home in town. It didn't make any sense. If you live in the city where you go to college, and aren't staying in a dorm, why would you pay money to live in someone else's home? One town over maybe - but the same town?
Another thing that bothered me is the author feeling the need to tell us every time Charlie did anything at all - used a penknife to open a letter, washed dishes, etc., including the fact that he mentions he forgot to wash his hands after dinner. So what? I don't know anyone who finishes a meal and then feels the need to run to the sink to wash their hands - unless, of course, you're eating messy food (they weren't). Every. Single. Action.
It didn't help that the characters were either dull or cardboard cutouts. Charlie is only 50, but acts like he's nearly 80. I know 60-year-olds with twice the life in them that he has. Justin also seemed a bit like a mama's boy, which is another reason I wondered why she allowed him to leave home in the first place.
While the best thing about the book was Diesel, he wasn't the detective and didn't help solve the crime. We just get a play-by-play of Diesel's actions, much like Charlie's. It keeps the plot slow-going, and I found myself losing interest quite a bit. We never learn enough about anyone in the book to know whether to like them or not; we're only given bits and pieces.
In the end, the murderer wasn't really a surprise, but the reasons the murder was committed was as old as time itself. I would like, in the next book, to see Charlie with some sort of life in him, and the characters get more definition.
https://www.amazon.com/Murder-Past-Due-Stacks-Mystery/dp/042523603X/
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2271209500
More on Miranda James's Books: https://www.fantasticfiction.com/j/miranda-james/
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