Customer Reviews

Artifacts (Faye Longchamp Mysteries, No. 1)

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
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A debut novel by Mary Anna Evans, this is wonderful mystery set in the panhandle of North Florida. Faye Longchamp is, at heart, an archeologist. However, she is driven to illegal digging to save Joyeuse, her ancestral home. While engaging in this activity, Faye, with her companion Joe (yum, yum!), uncover a body on one of the nearby islands. When they go back to examine it, the body had disappeared. Why? Who else knew?

Meanwhile, at the respectable dig where Faye is assisting a former professor, two of the students left on the island overnight disappear.

What is happening in Faye's quiet corner of the world? How could she keep Joyeuse? How could she keep Joyeuse hidden???
Who else was digging illegally?

I loved this book, and cannot wait for the next installment. I was pleasantly surprised with Ms. Evans first novel, and I continue to look forward to Faye's next adventure.

Off the coast of the Florida Panhandle lay the Last Isles and on Joyeuse lies the antebellum mansion belonging to Faye Longchamp. It is badly in need of repairs but Faye barely can pay taxes and the last thing she wants is lose the home that has been in her family for generations. She earns the money to pay the taxes by illegally digging up artifacts on her land and the National Wild Refuge and selling them to collectors whom don't care about the source.

Faye also works on an archeological dig on nearby Seagreen Island when two students in the group disappear. On a hunch, Faye starts digging and finds the two bodies, both shot to death. The dig is closed and Faye looks for artifacts on Water Island when she comes under attack by a man she thought was a friend and his partner who are digging up priceless Clovis artifacts. When she digs up the body of a young debutante who disappeared many years ago she comes to the attention a killer who intends to make Faye his fourth victim.

Faye is biracial and doesn't feel as if there is a place for her in mainstream society, which is why she is determined to hold on too her land, the only place she believes she belongs. She doesn't realize she has two killers who want her dead before she discovers and reveals their secrets. ARTIFACTS is an exciting and colorful amateur sleuth novel that is rich in atmosphere giving the reader a picture of what it takes to live in an island culture.

Harriet Klausner

Archaeology student Faye Longchamp is struggling to keep her ancestrail home of Joyeuse on Florida's northern gulf coast by illegally digging up artifacts on federal lands and selling them on the black market. However, one day she unearths a human skull and it doesn't look like it's been in the ground for a couple hundred years, more like only three or four decades, so it's not fresh, but not an artifact either, and judging by the head wound, this woman met a violent end. She decides to try and find out who the dead woman was on her own, as she can hardly go to the police and confess that she'd found the skull by illegally pot-hunting.

Then the next day two students on a legitimate dig she'd been working on wind up missing, then their bodies are found in shallow graves and she has to wonder if their deaths are tied in with her own dead person. And, of course, there is a very bad guy out there who wants to keep this all quiet, so Faye is in a spot of trouble.

ARTIFACTS won the Benjamin Franklin Award for Excellence in Mystery and it is easy to see why. This is a story that will keep any mystery buff glued to his chair till the reading is finished. A darned good debut, one you won't be able to put down, that what this book is.

As an archeology-phile, I was predisposed to like this first mystery by Mary Anna Evans. But there is so much more there than just archeology and mystery. Her characters are decidedly physical and real, the disparate elements of her plot, with the helping hand of Fate, dovetail perfectly to keep you reading until all the loose ends have been woven into place.

Faye Longchamp is a tough, smart, gutsy heroine who still savors her few chances to be feminine. Joe Wolf Mantooth, the simple-hearted Indian who shares her home, is a complex, realistic hero. It takes all the wit and strength that either of them has to get through what life throws in their way.

When the book opens, Faye has discovered the remains of a murdered woman while doing some illegal "pothunting" on Federal lands. She can't rest knowing the woman is alone and unavenged, but how can she report her discovery without sending herself to jail? By researching the "case" on her own, until she thinks she has the solution.

But almost immediately, two students working on a legitimate excavation with Faye are shot to death and buried in shallow graves. Does it have anything to do with Faye's find? While she works to make enough money selling black market artifacts to keep up the property taxes on her ancestral home, Joyeuse, she is dogged by the spectre of a man who has killed before, by the large-scale artifact thieves operating just a short distance from her, and by the outside world which has only suspicion for people who live without need of society or technology.

"Artifacts" is a smashing story, blending excerpts from the journal of several generations of former owners of Joyeuse with the contemporary occurrences which Evans weaves into a perfect, but never simple, tapestry of a story.

"Artifacts" was a group read selection for our on line forum, Mystery Most Cozy, last summer. The forum promotes new authors and, as moderator, I was delighted to add the selection to our reads.

Mary Anna Evans is a talented writer and in this debut mystery does a wonderful job of entertaining, yet challenging your mind at the same time. The characters, plot, and descriptive surroundings are well developed and interesting.

This is one new author who won't disappoint you if you're looking for a well written and well plotted mystery.

Faye Longchamp hates what her meager means have led her to. An assistant at an archeological dig by day, she behaves like a pothunter at night, digging for any artifact she can find and sell. Always on her mind is the need to pay the property taxes on her ancestral home. One valuable item is all that separates her from keeping her property safe for another year.

One evening's dig turns up a skull. Intrigued by this unexpected find, Faye takes an earring and begins to look into local stories of missing girls.

The next morning, Faye arrives at the dig site to find two students missing. When things begin not to add up, Faye gets concerned. When their bodies are found, the dig shuts down. How can Faye earn much needed money now?

Meanwhile, Faye is on a quest to gain back the rest of her ancestral lands. And there's another pothunter loose in her neck of the woods. Will he ruin a good site? Will his digging get her arrested for her illegal work as well?

This book is very literary in style and not like the mysteries I'm used to reading. As such, I started to get very frustrated with it. The story had too many threads and the cast of characters was a little hard to keep straight. Furthermore, Faye's questionable morals also rankled me. But as the story progressed, I began to sort things out and got hooked. The plot may have bitten off one or two sub-plots more then it really needed, but they all come together well. Faye grew into a character I couldn't help but love. And I just couldn't put the book down when I reached the climax.

I'm glad I stuck it out and finish the book. It was well worth the time and energy invested in it. I will most certainly be getting the next one.

I enjoy mystery series but several that I read have become rather predictable. This was fresh, interesting and fun to read. I have ordered her new book, not yet released. I highly recommend this book to mystery fans.

Artifacts is one of those books that isn't written, it is crafted. It is Evans' first book and it is packed with descriptive detail, multiple plot lines, and interesting characters with lots of back story. This book is a page-turner as the reader gets sucked into Faye Longchamp's struggle to save her historic home, solve the murders of two co-workers, solve the mystery of the disappearing skeleton and... but I don't want to ruin it for you.

Faye is a fascinating character. She has a background in archaeology and knows that the illegal artifact hunting she is doing to generate cash and keep her historic home in the family is wrong, but she is desperate. She is without family and doesn't have much of a support group or a safety net, but she has a goal and she is determined. Evans has given us so much detail about Faye and her situation that the reader has a great deal of empathy for her and her plight. As events unfold, Faye has to make some hard decisions. Evans clearly plotted this book carefully and keeps Faye's choices true to her character - she doesn't take the easy way out and leads the reader down paths that are sometimes unexpected but feel right.

This book is a delight to read. It is a wonderful blend of the past and present and, along the way, you learn a little bit about archaeology, flint-knapping, historic homes, slavery, and the illegal trade in artifacts. This is the kind of book you recommend to everyone you know - and anxiously await the author's next book.

Favorite character? That is a hard one. Joe, Liz, and Magda are all friends of Faye, are great characters, and are all given great moments in which to shine. I think it has to be a three-way tie. Did I guess it? Yes - but that didn't detract from the book one bit. Will I read another? Just as soon as it comes out!

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I can not believe I let a gem like this slip past me. Ms. Evans does such a great job with detail; I could almost smell the Florida air. I got so wrapped up in this book that I felt like one of those annoying people that talk to the screen during an exciting movie, saying things like "don't go in there" or "no, not him." I couldn't stop myself, which, to me is the mark of a really satisfying read.

Since I was one of the unfortunate soles that didn't know this book existed, I was content in the knowledge that a continuation of the series would be waiting for me when I finished. Imagine my surprise when I discovered that there isn't one. Ms. Evans, you're very good at this, don't stop.

I picked up this book on a lark looking to expand my stable of authors. Was I glad I did. This book is very well written and paced. I know nothing about archaeology, but I enjoyed all of the information in the book.

Great job by the author. Take a chance on a new author and read this book!