Customer Reviews

The Alpine Decoy (An Emma Lord Mystery)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

After reading the complete Mrs. Pollifax series by Dorothy Gilman, I decided to give Mary Daheim and her Emma Lord mysteries a try. I have read Alpine Decoy and Alpine Escape so far, and I loved both of them. The books are hard to put down, mainly because of the suspense. The only downfall is how long it takes to get to the real "meat" of the story. If you like murder mysteries on the lighter side, this is a good series of books to go with.

Having once lived in Monroe WA for a short time, and visited Stephens Pass on more than one occasion, I find it very easy to picture the area of Alpine in my mind. As a writer, I really like having a series that involves a small-town newspaper. I must confess I like this series much better than the author's other series set in a bed-and-breakfast in Seattle.

I started this series just recently with one of the newer books, but was so intrigued by the characters that I went back to the beginning, and am working my way through the alphabet. What fun! I like everything about this series: the writing, the characters, the plotting.

Also impressive is the author's willingness to tackle the subject of racism and prejudice in this small town, and in my opinion, she does it very well, indeed. It was obviously serendipity that brought me to this book just three days before the inauguration of our new president. I hope life proceeds as well for him as it does for Emma Lord, the owner/publisher of the Alpine Advocate. As for me, I'm off to find the next book in the series.

Another one of Mary Daheim's Emma Lord mysteries hits all the right notes. Easy reading, but keeps the suspense up. The only problem I had with it is I finished it too fast. Enjoyed a book with little description of violence and some very funny lines.

I enjoyed this book, I've enjoyed all of her books. They are good, make you think, not too 'blood and guts' -- I really don't like that. I would recommend her books to anyone who enjoys a good 'who dun it'. They are very interesting and you can pick it up the next day without having to go back and read again. To me it's 'lite' reading at its best.

I like all of this book series by Emma Lord. She is an interesting writer.

Things are about normal in Alpine. Emma Lord, owner and publisher of the Alpine advocate is worried about whether she should go to the Washington Newspaper Publishers Association convention.

The fact that her ex-lover, father of her son Adam, Tom Cavanaugh will be there makes the decision much more difficult. Even though this bum left her pregnant to go back with his pregnant wife, who he married for her money twenty years ago, Emma still thinks she's in love with him. And now that his wife is looney and his other kids are a mess, Tom suddenly decides he wants to have a relationship with their college student son.

Meanwhile, there is a new woman in town. African-American, Marilynn Lewis who is the new nurse for Dr's Dewey and Flake.
She's living with the Campbells, a prominant local family, but that doesn't stop a local bigot from sending her hate mail.

Things get worse when an unknown African-American male stumbles into Marlow Whipp's grocery store and drops dead on the floor from a bullet.

Who is the man, why would he be in Alpine and who would want to kill him?

Emma puts on her sleuthing hat to try and uncover the mystery, including discovering that:

The victim, Kelvin Greene from Seattle is the boyfriend of Marilynn's former roommate Winola.

Marilynn's former boyfriend Jerome was murdered.

The supposed murderer, Wesley Charles has escaped from prison.

Then Wesley Charles also shows up dead in Alpine.

Who else but Marilynn could have killed him? Unless, it has something to do with the strange goings on at Marlow Whipp's grocery store. How can he stay in business when only teenagers come into his store? What is he actually selling besides pop & candy?

Milo Dodge, the sheriff seems more interested in locating the stolen local high school mascot than in solving the two murders. So Emma feels she has to continually prod him along.

Meanwhile, Carla has new apartment and Libby a new roommate, but she's still as ditzy as ever. Ed Bronsky, the advertising manager still doesn't want to sell advertisement. After all, why advertise groceries, people have to eat so they'll always go to your store anyway.

And Vida Runkel the house & home reporter, who is related to and knows every one in town continues to help.

I enjoyed the story, although I did figure out the killer, but couldn't figure out the motive. It's not quite as good as the earlier books, but still more enjoyable than most series.

Highlight of the story: While a couple of hikers are leading them to the location of the second body, Milo grabs and kisses Emma. Not quite the proper setting but at least it's a start.

Lowlight of the story. The last page. After you read it, you can read my review on the earlier books and know what I'm talking about, don't want to spoil anything.

Looking forward to the next book, Alpine Escape.

This fourth book of the Alpine series centers around Marilynn, a new nurse in town, who is African-American. She receives hate mail and is discriminated against in different ways. When two African-American males are killed in Alpine, people begin to suspect that Marilynn is connected with the crimes. Newspaper editor Emma Lord takes Marilynn under her wing and decides to protect her from slander and accusations of murder. Emma and her friends uncover some things about Marilynn's background which connect her to the victims, but Emma is convinced that she did not commit the murders. After a few red herrings, Emma finally discovers the truth. This is an enjoyable read, but it was difficult for me to believe that there would be this much discrimination in the 90's and a few loose ends were left at the end, such as who was sending Marilynn the hate mail. Despite these flaws, Daheim is always a good read.

I absolutely love this series. I can't wait to return to Alpine again