From Booklist
Thirtysomething Aurora "Roe" Teagarden is a widow who lives in a small southern town where she works very part-time in the library. It's the sort of place where everyone seems to be divorced from everyone else. Roe finds her stepbrother's wife, Poppy, murdered, and the complicated extramarital escapades of both Poppy and Poppy's husband unfold in an unpleasant fashion throughout the tale. Meanwhile, Roe's teenage half-brother has hitchhiked across the country to Roe to escape his parents' wrangling; Roe's mystery-writer boyfriend, Robin, is bringing his mom to meet her over Thanksgiving; and more and more people turn out to have had reason to wish Poppy dead. Roe is a genuine steel magnolia: even when she suffers from terminal second-guessing of herself, she knows what's proper and what a lady would do--and, mostly, she does it. Entertaining fare, but very different from Harris' darker Lily Bard series.
GraceAnne DeCandidoCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Product Description
On the way to a lunch meeting of her local book discussion group, the Uppity Women, small-town Southern librarian Aurora "Roe" Teagarden is shocked and dismayed to find her sister-in-law Poppy lying bloody and dead right outside her own back door. Poppy had her flaws, certainly-she and her husband were having trouble staying faithful to each other-but she didn't deserve to be so brutally murdered.
Investigating a case like this is never easy, of course, given the gossipy atmosphere of any small town, what with Poppy and her husband's extramarital affairs, the local police detective (who also happens to be a former boyfriend of Roe's) and his seemingly unresolved feelings for Poppy, and the need to protect Poppy's family. But Roe is also coping with a burgeoning romantic relationship as well as the sudden appearance of her teenaged half brother. All in all, it's a lot for one woman to have on her plate, even one as together as Roe.
Longtime readers and new fans alike will delight in Roe's exploits as she employs her impeccable knowledge of small town politics and enchanting Southern charm to solve the crime in this wonderful installment of Charlaine Harris' terrific cozy series.
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