Crimes and Covers
A Magical Bookshop Mystery
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4.7 • 25 Ratings
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- $13.99
Publisher Description
Violet Waverly sleuths a Thoreau-ly puzzling Christmastime murder in Agatha Award-winning, USA Today bestselling author Amanda Flower's fifth Magical Bookshop mystery.
Christmas is coming to the Western New York village of Cascade Springs, and so is the long-awaited wedding of Charming Books proprietor Violet Waverly and police chief David Rainwater. Grandma Daisy and Violet's best friend, Sadie, go all out to make the nuptials the event of the season--whether Violet likes it or not. But the reception becomes memorable for all the wrong reasons when a woman's dead body floats by on the frigid Niagara River.
Violet is shocked to recognize the deceased as a mysterious woman who visited Charming Books two days before the wedding, toting a rare first edition of Henry David Thoreau's Walden. Well aware that a mint condition copy could be worth more than $14,000, Violet told the woman she would have to have the book appraised before she could consider buying it. Most displeased, the woman tucked the precious tome under her arm and stormed out of the shop. Now she's dead, and an enigmatic message scrawled in pen upon her palm reads, "They stole my book."
It's a confounding case, indeed. But fortunately, Violet can draw on the resources of her bookshop's magical consciousness, which communicates clues to Violet via quotes from Walden. With Emerson the tuxedo cat and Faulkner the crow at her side, Violet sets out to recover the priceless book by solving a murder most transcendental.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In Agatha-winner Flower's whimsical fifth Magical Bookshop mystery (after 2019's Verse and Vengeance), an obnoxious customer who won't give her name tries to sell Violet Waverly, the owner of Charming Books in Cascade Springs, N.Y., a signed first edition of Henry David Thoreau's Walden. Thoreau expert Violet, who suspects the book is stolen, turns the woman down. Two days later, just after Violet's wedding to police chief David Rainwater, David fishes the drowned body of the customer out of a river. With their honeymoon on hold, Violet and David try to solve the mystery of the woman's death and check out the claims of Imogene Thoreau, who says she's a descendant of Thoreau and the book's rightful owner. Violet, aided by a mystical essence that inhabits her bookstore, strives to interpret the spirit's quotes from Walden that will lead her to the truth. The murder of an antiquarian bookseller raises the stakes. This is perfect reading for a winter's night when a bit of magic mixes well with a strong dose of murder most literary.
