Customer Reviews

Tool & Die (Home Repair Is Homicide Mysteries)

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Readers who are also viewers of the myriad home improvement shows flooding television networks will find plenty to delight them in TOOL & DIE, the eighth book in the "Home Repair is Homicide" mystery series. Not only does Sarah Graves spin an entertaining story, she also includes home repair tips throughout the book.

Eastport is located on Moose Island, seven miles off the coast of Maine "and so far downeast that it's almost in Canada." Despite its rural location, life here is anything but dull. For Jacobia "Jake" Tiptree --- Wall Street executive turned small-town gal turned resident snoop --- there is no shortage of fixer-uppers, whether it's the rambling house she lives in or one of her fellow Eastport residents.

Jake and her best friend, Ellie, have yet to encounter a problem they can't solve. So when Jake wins a month of housekeeping services at a church fair, she's determined to get to the bottom of Bella Diamond's hygienic but unhealthy compulsion for cleanliness. It turns out that Bella has been hiding her anxiety at receiving life-threatening letters behind a broom and a mop. Her ex-husband, newly released from prison, is the likely suspect...until he turns up dead after being whacked in the head with a cast iron skillet. Snooping is rarely risk-free, and Jake and Ellie soon find themselves tangling with a cunning killer.

This well-crafted mystery is filled with twists, turns, clever dialogue, and a cast of characters so endearing you'll be ready to move into one of the spare bedrooms in Jake's house. If you're new to the series, TOOL & DIE is a fine place to start. As you're reading you'll know there are plenty more adventures with Jake and company to go back and savor.

If you want to know how to fix a hairline plaster crack, you'll find the answer in TOOL & DIE. And if it's a witty, enjoyable whodunit you're seeking to while away the afternoon with, you'll find that here too.

--- Reviewed by Shannon McKenna

Jacobia "Jake" Tiptree still lives in Eastport on Moore Island seven miles off the coast of Maine where she still is fixing up her 1823 Federal home. In a raffle, she won the housekeeping services of Bella for several weeks, but the woman acts loony driving Jake's household crazy. When Jake confronts her, Bella says she has been receiving death threats letters left in her home; she thinks her ex-husband Jim Diamond, just released from jail for forging checks, is the culprit.

Jake and her best friend Ellie visit Jim but when they get to his apartment, he keels over on Jake. Someone caved in his head with something heavy. Jake and Ellie decide to find out who did the deed because the State Police believe Bella is the guilty party as she had motive, means and opportunity. Besides Bella, her daughter, Jake's son ex-girlfriend, and the town banker who was scammed by him, wanted him dead. Their sleuthing comes to the attention of the killer who decides Jake and Ellie will be the next victims.

TOOL & DIE is a very exciting amateur sleuth mystery due in part because readers get to see Jake as a wife, mother and daughter as well as a snoop. There are practical easy to follow home repair tips scattered throughout the book which gives another layer of authenticity to the storyline. It is obvious the author knows about home repairs and the instructions she gives will prove useful to homeowners. There are a lot of suspects with motives making it very difficult to decide who the murderer is even with a few good clues sprinkled throughout the entertaining amateur sleuth plot.

Harriet Klausner

I'm a huge fan of the Sarah Graves "Home Repair is Homicide" mystery series. I've read every one-- and was looking forward to Tool & Die...until I read it. I found it nearly unreadable. I labored through the first few chapters and then decided to just crack open the book somewhere in the middle and continue reading from that point forward. That's the first time in my life that I've done that! I have no issue with the plot/story structure or the main/returning characters. However, the new characters (the ones central to the homicide) I found to be thinly drawn. One further gripe: the "Home Repair is Homicide Repair Tips" which pop-up through out Tool & Die in mid-chapter accompanied by cutesily-bordered text boxes really detract from the book. Whereas Sarah Graves once incorporated how-to tips throughout her books by including them within her storylines, having them just appear randomly throughout the book in the middle of page and in the middle of a chapter serves no purpose except to fill space. It's laziness on the writer's part or poor judgment on her editor's part. Her first eight books in this series were fun, well-thought out, engaging, and tightly written. Tool & Die is not. Don't bother.

I love Sarah Graves' mysteries. I've read most of the home repair series and hope to get the rest of them.

I read the authors Home Repair novels beacuse I am a tool belt woman that can identify with the constant fixing up of houses.
Sarah Graves has a cast of characters that sometimes are confusing but her books are overall well written and you can get 'into her head'. I would reccomend them for all my sisters in home repair hell...

As a Downeastern Mainer myself, I loved this story line. As with all of Sarah Graves's "A Home Repair Is Homicide Mystery" novels, I read it almost in one sitting and enjoyed every minute of it.