10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Southern gentility at its funniest., February 17, 1997
By A Customer
"Gilt by Association" and Tamar Myer's first Abigail Timberlake novel "Larceny and Old Lace" are the funniest mysteries I've read in a long time. The plot is tight, the characters are hysterical, and Abigail Timberlake is a true Southern lady
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A body in the armoire, September 27, 2000
Abigail Timberlake, the intrepid owner of the Den of Antiquity, is pleased to be able to acquire a beautiful four-piece set of furniture at an estate sale. When the set is delivered, she discovers a dead body in the armoire. The set was purchased from an eccentric family, the Barrases, who provide Abby with an interesting list of suspects. As in most families, there are varying degrees of greed and lust and Abby spends most of her time conjecturing as to who could have committed the murder. The author further develops some of the characters from the first book, such as Rob and Bob, and introduces some new ones such as C.J. (Calamity Jane.) The narrative and plot are smoother in this second novel, and the author, although injecting humor does not push it too far. A fun read!
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Pass the Sweet and Sour Okra Please, May 14, 2005
Abigail Temberlake, the owner of an antique shop in Charlotte, North Carolina buys an expensive 18th century French armoire at an auction and this story begins when the armoire is delivered to her shop. The armoire is not what kicks off the story; it is instead the body that she finds inside. The police don't suspect her in the murder but they close down her shop while they investigate and she finds herself momentarily out of business with Christmas just weeks away. Needing desperately to get her shop opened back up, Abigail decides to use her newly found free time to do some investigating of her own.
Abigail is not, nor does she consider herself to be a detective, which is a refreshing change within the genera of book. She bumbles and stumbles her way along the trail of clues with all the subtlety of the proverbial bull in a china shop. Along the way her shop is burglarized, her house is broken into while she soaks in the tub and an elderly lady with whom she is about to have tea is poisoned. Finally, while following a false trail she stumbles onto the real killer and once again finds herself in mortal danger.
Many of the characters from the first book are inexplicably missing from this story. I can't help but wonder why the author spent so much time introducing her readers to the Charlotte antique community in the first book of this series if she were just going to drop them in the second. Especially noticeable is the absence of Tony who inherited the shop next to Abigail's in the last book. Suddenly there is a new person in that shop named Jane who the other shop owners refer to as CJ, short for Calamity Jane. She comes from out of nowhere to play a major role in this story, second only to Abigail who is of course the heroine. Rob and his partner Bob still have major roles in this story as does Yankee Bob's cuisine, which includes fish broth. Rob keeps asking for steak or hamburger and one cold night he and Abigail sneak out onto the patio and eat a box of doughnuts after a dinner of roasted eel. Wynnell is also still a very visible character and she still blames all misfortune on Yankees.
These characters and the very Southern atmosphere more than make up for a plot that gets a little lost at times. Abigail is a little brash for a Southern lady, or gentleman for that matter but she does run to the store and stock up on milk and bread after the radio weather mentions snow. We Southerners do tend to panic when we hear the s word. I absolutely fell in love with Bubba's China Gourmet, a restaurant that specializes in Southern Chinese food. Not food from Southern China, Abigail explains, but Chinese food from the South. Their specialties include stir-fried collard greens, sweet and sour okra and moo goo gai grits. There is also a Catholic Funeral at which a very tall Presbyterian gentleman sits up front having no idea when to sit, stand or kneel. Since most of the people at the service are also not Catholic and have no idea what to do they follow the lead of the man up front. Needless to say half of the crowd is always doing the wrong thing at the wrong time making a shambles of the funeral.
This is obviously not a hard core mystery but there are still areas of the book where I couldn't wait to see what happened next. This is a light-hearted, happy mystery that will make you laugh out loud and maybe even crave some stir-fried collards. The last chapter is almost like a scene out of the Waltons that ends not with "good night John-Boy" but with "shut up Jane" and "a Merry Christmas was had by all", even Jewish Rob. Just like the merry time you will have as you journey with Tamar Myers through this engaging and hilarious Southern mystery.
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