Family Album: A Mellingham Mystery

by Susan Oleksiw

Book Overview

Beautiful Mellingham--it appears to be a safe haven on the New England coast where men, women, and children, old and young, can live in peace and harmony. But looks can deceive, as Chief of Police Joe... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0684197316
• ISBN13: 9780684197319
• Release Date: January 1995
• Publisher: Scribner Book Company
• Length: 287 Pages
• Weight: 0.97 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 5.8" x 8.8"

Customer Reviews

Another absorbing small town police procedural from Oleksiw

I won't waste space describing the plot of this book as it's been ably done by earlier reviewers. It's the kind of writing and story that kept me reading far into the night, long after I should have been asleep. The writing is fine, the characters are fascinating and so well defined that you can understand them even if you've never personally known anyone like them. As with all of Susan Oleksiw's work that I've read, I highly recommend it.

Believable eccentrics and an intricate plot

Oleksiw's thoroughly enjoyable cozy, set in the New England seaport village of Mellingham, centers around the Arbella Historical Society and its members, a cast of eccentric but believable characters. When one of them is murdered with an arcane horticultural poison, Chief of Police Joe Silva quickly discerns that each has a secret.George Frome, the murdered man, was a spartan master of efficiency who suspected a thief among the members. Or did he? The day of the monthly board meeting Frome called Silva to Arbella House to inspect security. But Silva couldn't shake the feeling Frome was putting on a show for some hidden purpose of his own. Frome's suspicions cause fireworks at the board meeting and the next day Frome is found dead in the attic, sprawled before a group of 19th-century paintings which don't belong there.Suspects include a society matriarch who was about to sell an important family heirloom to Frome; her heir and nephew whose devotion to his garden is exceeded only by his devotion to his aunt; an obnoxious social climber with a new interest in 19th-paintings; an antiques dealer on the verge of financial ruin, and a single mother whose fear of the past leads to panic attacks and strange acts of household cleaning.Oleksiw moves easily among the minds of these characters, heightening the reader's curiosity with glimpses of their private terrors. Silva, the Portuguese outsider, learns to distinguish between real secrets and "village secrets," which everyone but him is privy to, while showing a sharp eye for small betraying gestures and guarding against his attraction to Gwen McDuffy, the wary single mother.Silva, late forties and unmarried, is haunted by melancholy for the family he might never have. Oleksiw leaves the door wide open for future romance. This, together with the author's flair for character, plot intricacies, red herrings and the delightful setting, will leave readers happily anticipating the next Mellingham mystery.