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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
21 of 22 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
not her best,
By
This review is from: Sins and Needles (Needlecraft Mysteries) (Hardcover)
i really looked forward to this installment of the needlework series--i thought the last two were very good.the clever title is here, the tortuous plot is here (somewhat less plausible than previous plots in the series), but our sleuth is almost absent, and the rest of the 'regulars' have only walk-on parts. the series hook, needlework of one kind or another, is present only in a gauzy fashion. almost all the important action takes place away from the shop and without the series detective involved. betsy devonshire steps in at nearly the last moment to reveal the culprit, after minimal clues start appearing to single him out. there's a lot more padding in this outing than in most of the series--a whole page is devoted to reiterating the family relations, several pages are wasted on the series sleuth's imagining motives and means for all the suspects. there's also a tone of condescension in the description of the antiques that are part of the story--i found it hard to imagine the characters could be so ignorant. the knitting pattern included, well, it would have been nice to have had at least a line drawing of it. a verbal description is not at all the same thing! this book is for the reader who simply has to have every volume in a series. i'm giving mine to the library and crossing my fingers for the next book in the series, which i intend to buy used.
13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Another great entry in the series.,
By
This review is from: Sins and Needles (Needlecraft Mysteries) (Hardcover)
This is one of my favorite series, but after reading the reviews I opened it with some trepidation.I think that it is as good as always: the complex plot, the dry humor, the mixed feelings of the characters. The characters are, as usual, well-developed. I hope that some of these characters will at least be featured as minor characters in future books. Characters who reappear, even if only intermittently, add to the fullness and reality of the author's universe. I kept promising myself to put it down at the end of the chapter, and ended up reading it through. One of the things that I like about this book is that it does deal with people and their work, one of the most ignored themes in literature, except for artists and detectives. In this book, the characters discuss the realities of running one's own business. I was very amused in an earlier book when Betsy went from being a tenant complaining about the poor maintenance by a greedy landlord to being the landlord who had to pay for repairs. The people also have a relatively realistic view of money: they like having it, even if they wouldn't necessarily do almost anything to get it. I get very tired of books about wealthy people of leisure, or at least an oddly undemanding job, with an apparently inexhaustible private income. In this book, except for Betsy and Godwin, the regular cast of characters make only cameo appearances. In itself, I don't find this a problem, although of course I want to see the regulars again, I thoroughly enjoyed these characters. I am a trifle disappointed that there wasn't a book between this one and the last with a subplot centering on Jill and her new baby, but I don't consider it to be a flaw of this book, per se. The reviews make it clear that the gang is not all here; readers can choose for themselves.
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
what a disappointment!,
By Sunnyvale Reader (Sunnyvale, California United States) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Sins and Needles (Needlecraft Mysteries) (Hardcover)
I have to wonder if the writer forgot which series she is working on, as the Crewel World cast of characters in AWOL in this book. Instead, the investigator, and dominant character, is a cop we've never heard of from some other town, and the victim and suspects are mainly new, and extremely UNAPPEALING characters. (by the end of the book I was hoping they'd all kill one another off so we could be done with them).I think the author should be flogged with a typewriter ribbon for giving Jill, who was pregnant last we knew, a one sentence cameo in this book with no mention of the baby. Betsy seems peripheral rather than central to the story, and what she does do is far too improbable for even mystery fiction. I hope this book is quickly superseded by a better one, with the return of Excelsior's favorite characters. addendum: reader beware: the reason I didn't find the info on Jill's baby the first time I read the book was because the book was missing a chapter - seems like there are some defective copies floating around. I still think the writer did an inadequate job of blending old and new characters in this book.
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