Customer Reviews

The Book of Old Houses (Home Repair Is Homicide Mysteries)

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

 

 

This entry in the long running series finds Jake still in a quandry over the old book she found in the cellar of her Maine 'fixer upper'. And like the old house that never seems to be completed, I did not find that the story line was complete....convuluted, over busy, full of starts and stops, yes. Finished, certainly...Complete, no. I have been a big fan of Jake's stories from the first but this one falls flat. Maybe I still miss Victor! I have never been a fan of Ellie's (too contrived) or Wade's (off to the boat...go catch a murderer....see you later). In my opinion the storyline couldn't decide whether to develop into a straight who-dunit, branch out into a supernatural thriller, or just turn into a morality tale. (Bad guy corrupts weird kid in an quaint setting and they all wear aluminum foil hats forever). And poor Sam. PLEASE find him a purpose in life. I will eagerly await the next book and hope for the best.

I couldn't finish this book. When I started it, I felt like I was coming in in the middle of a story. I didn't know what this old book was Jake found, when she found it, why she gave it away for research...I guess I'd have to start with book 1 in this series, but I didn't know this WAS a series until I began reading.

Usually, though, in series, the authors do a good job of updating you on what has happened. I found that wasn't case in "The Book of Old Houses". I also found I didn't care about ANY of the characters! They just didn't come to life for me. Frustrating since I actually bought this book.

The fictional world created by Sarah Graves in her Home Repair is Homicide series is one of my favorites. I enjoyed this book, as I have every book in the series so far. In fact, after I read this one, I started the series over again.

This story was a little hard to get into. In some ways it was frustrating to read. When she was going all over town trying to get clues and investigate, she was supposed to have a party that afternoon, and she kept saying she needed to get home and work on it, and she never did. The party came off with everyone helping, but that doesn't often happen in real life. I usually enjoy Sarah Graves novels, and this one had some good things in it, but it was not a real enjoyable read.

Jacobia "Jake" Tiptree seems to always be fixing up something in her 1823 Eastport, Maine home yet finds the time to solve a murder or two. However, this time she gets spooked when she finds a book in the foundation of her basement. It seems written in blood and contains names of people who have lived in the house through the almost two centuries including the current spooked occupant. She sends the book to rare book expert Horace Robotham for authentication.

Horace is murdered and the book vanished. His friend David DiMaio arrives at Jake's house introducing himself as the late Horace's friend. He also insists he drove to Eastport because someone he went to school with Bert Merkle had a motive to kill Horace. Dave asks questions of the household and the townsfolk. Horace's lonely friend Jason Riverton is killed and in a separate incident so is wannabe author Ann Talbert. The police claim the latter two deaths were coincidental misfortunate accidents; Jake refuses to believe the probability of so much coincidence as winning the lottery has better odds. She risks her life to prove a killer is working the book beat.

Jake is a strong independent woman, who does most of the repairs and renovations to her fixer-upper; she also worries about her son Sam who just got out of jail while planning a poster for the town patriarch. Dave is the catalyst who sets much of the events in motion, but Jake is the tough broad trying to fix the problem. Sarah Graves latest "home repair" cozy is a grand regional amateur sleuth.

Harriet Klausner

"The Book of Old Houses" is eleventh in Sarah Graves' "Home Repair is Homicide" series of cozies, about which the "Denver Post" said, more cleverly than I can formulate, "think Diane Mott Davidson with a tool belt instead of recipes."

Indeed, "Old Houses" continues the tale of Jacobia "Jake" Tiptree, formerly money manager to some of Manhattan's richest and most dreadful, married to a prominent doctor with an eye so wandering hospital workers called him "Vlad the Impaler;" and a teenage son, Sam, developing an alcohol problem. So she up and moves into an 1823 fixer-upper in the quaint small town of Eastport, Maine, where she finds lots of local color, a much nicer new husband, Wade, and sends Sam to a rehabilitation facility. Then she suddenly finds a long-buried book hidden in her cellar, and it has her name in it, written, apparently, in blood. And soon pretty little Eastham is practically awash in blood, while Jake nearly gets herself killed, too. Finally,as a nice little fillip, the book comes with helpful old house remodeling tips,at the head of each chapter.

Graves actually lives with her husband in Eastport, Maine, in an 1823 Federal-style house that helped inspire this series. She's a good, quick, fun writer, and the book's an accessible, easy-going read. But while the home repair tips are useful; unfortunately, as in that old story of the three little pigs who built their houses to suit themselves, the mystery's made of straw. Anybody who can't guess the villain long before everyone starts confessing their sins is not a heavy reader of mysteries. Can't recommend this to the heavy reader of mysteries, unless you too have an old house to fix up.

I want to be very clear that this book isn't bad (far from it). It just didn't have the punch and zing for me that the previoius books had.

The series is set in the fishing village of Eastport, Maine and the main character is Jacobia ("Jake") Tiptree who moved to the area after a successful, but difficult, financial services career in Manhattan. Jake has purchased an old home that is in need of massive amounts of repair and she spent much of this book dealing with the antiquated bathroom with mixed results.

As always, the setting is really enjoyable in this series and a part of me always wants to move there after reading her books. The mystery wasn't as strong and I think that was because most of the characters involved in this one were introduced during this book -- didn't draw on as many of the repeating characters as before. I missed Wade and George and even Ellie seemed to be hovering around the edges versus an integral part of the plot. The other thing that really bothered me was the unrealistic dealing with a major party that Jake was holding. She had the whole town coming to a party she was hosting and spent the entire day running around town doing unrelated things (investigating the mystery) while worrying about all these guests arriving -- she just needed to go home and take care of things ! She arrives home and starts dealing with a stuck bathtub 45 minutes before the party and then ends up taking a bath while her guests are there -- didn't make sense when she was supposedly so worried about pulling off a successful party. It didn't work well for me.

I definitely think the series is still going along just fine and will read the next one when I get a chance --

Sarah Graves' home repair mysteries are all very good and it is not necessary to read them in order to enjoy them. While not great literature, they are well thought out plots although a bit fanciful. Good Maine atmosphere, makes you want to eat lobster!

What can I say, every book that I have read from Sarah Graves has been terrific. Her connection with the area is also very good and being from Maine I can understand her so well. Also having to fix up and old cottage, her mistakes have also been mine.
Keep on writing.
DD

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book. I never guessed who the killer was. A good read!