Death Takes A Mistress-Rosemary & Larry Mild

Death Takes A Mistress

Rosemary & Larry Mild

Magic Island Literary Works, Jul 31 2014, $14.95

www.magicile.com

ISBN: 9780983859758

In 1982 Bath, England, Wayne Sachs comes home from work to see the door to his neighbor Lainee Cohen’s flat open.  He mentions it to his wife Janie who is worried about the young single mom as Lainee is running late to pick up her three month old infant Ivy.  The couple enters the apartment only to find Lainee’s corpse.  The Sachs raise Ivy along with their own two children as part of the family while the homicide goes cold with the only vague clue involving a Jewish family in Annapolis, Maryland.

In 2005, Ivy heads to the States seeking to locate her paternal family with one goal in mind: find her mom’s lover (her biological father) who killed her.  Ivy obtains a clerk position at The Olde Victorian Bookstore owned and run by Dan and Rivka Sherman; and through them a room at the Widow Riley’s house, a place where Rivka was held prisoner (see Death Goes Postal).  Reluctantly Ivy admits her reason for being in Maryland.  Dan’s lawyer-friend Joel Wise obtains 1979-1983 records that list families starting a business in Annapolis.  Rivka and Dan reduce the potential number to four.  However, someone is not just unwelcoming as this person tries to kill the Englishwoman.

The second Dan and Rivka Sherman cozy is a super cold case mystery (it went frozen twenty-three years ago) wrapped inside a family drama as Ivy learns what matters in life, how fortunate she has been with people caring for and about her, and that revenge is insignificant.  The keys to this fabulous tale are the amateur sleuthing seems genuine and Ivy keeps the storyline focused as refreshingly the prime player. 

Harriet Klausner