Category: Mystery

I Will Fear No Evil! It’s Easy to Get Hooked on Reading This Christian Mystery Series

It’s been so long since I discovered this series that I forget how I discovered it. The good news, for you, is that the author, Debbie Viguie, is a prolific writer and is about to release the last book in the Psalm 23 Mystery series. Book 23 is on preorder and is title Forever. The latest book Amazon currently has is book 17. The first book is The Lord is My Shepherd. Christianbook has the first two books together in one ebook. The secret to gaining access to the preorder books is to join her Facebook fan group. Debbie posts often in the fan group.

This entertaining saga is a character-driven murder mystery series. In the first book, Cindy’s church is getting ready to celebrate Easter. Cindy Preston is a secretary at First Shepard Church. She stumbles across a dead man’s body in the sanctuary. Jeremiah Silverman is a rabbi that works at a Jewish Temple next door. Jeremiah has a mysterious past that is gradually revealed as the series picks up steam.

Debbie weaves information about Passover celebrations and Jewish traditions in the background, but the story centers around how Cindy and Jeremiah meet and work together to solve mysteries they discover in their hometown. Detective Mark Walters tries, unsuccessfully, to convince Cindy and Jeremiah to let him handle the investigation. Once engrossed in the story, it feels like you’re watching a movie instead of reading a book. (The book isn’t for the squeamish, but it’s not graphic.)

Please chime in and comment below if you are familiar with the series.
(Also, I’d love to hear what you think if you decide to give this series a try!)

Deadly Exposure

I read the Steeple Hill Love Inspired series often, and naturally, I like their suspense line of stories. They release four a month. These books are good for a fast, interesting read. I just finished reading one of the books for May 2008. Cara Putnam kindly sent me her book to read and review.

Deadly Exposure (Steeple Hill Love Inspired Suspense #102) starts with a murder at a theater. News reporter Dani Richards happened to be at the theater that night with her aunt. While trying to deal with her distress at finding a college student she knows dead, Dani also finds herself being questioned by her ex-boyfriend and police officer Caleb Jamison. He broke her heart years ago and hadn’t heard from him in ten years. Dani does some investigating of her own against the wishes of Caleb, who is trying his best to protect her from threatening phone calls and damage to her car and home.

Both of the main characters are easy to like. Caleb’s persistence in trying to solve the case and protect Dani shows his true devotion to Dani even though he treated her poorly in the past. Dani struggles with her past and searches for God while she also tries to solve the case. I appreciate the way that Cara Putnam resolves the problems of this frustrated couple.

Abomination

If you’ve read the other books in the Rock Harbor series by Colleen Coble, you’ll be glad that this book, Abomination, allows you to once again follow Bree and her dog Samson again in the town of Rock Harbor. Bree is helping a distressed woman who has amnesia try to figure out who she is and who attacked her. She thinks her name is Elena because she is wearing a necklace with that name engraved on the back of it. She has a two year old daughter, Kerri, with her, but she can’t remember giving birth to her. Bree and her husband, Nick, give Elena and Kerri shelter and food as long as they need it.

The police in Rock Harbor start working with the Michigan state police to solve a series of murders. All the murders have the same pattern and the women are found with body parts missing. Elena realizes that she escaped the murderer and that he is still after her.

I enjoyed the story. Colleen Coble is a gifted writer and her stories are usually very interesting. I prefer authors not to tell the story from the criminal’s point of view, but with this story, I can see how it helps. Abomination is not too graphic or gory, but it is disturbing. It’s hard to understand how anyone can kill so many people and feel no remorse.

This is the series that inspired me to visit the Upper Peninsula in Michigan. That and the advice of some of our friends at church. Abomination makes a few references to Lake Superior being the best lake. I quite agree. The water is so blue and there is a nice beach on the grounds of the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum. The grounds also house the Whitefish Point lighthouse. You can enjoy a great tasting pasty like Nick did in this story. Visiting the Shipwreck Museum was so much fun!

If you read this story and like it, check out all the Rock Harbor books!

Without a Trace (Rock Harbor Series #1)
Beyond a Doubt (Rock Harbor Series #2)
Into the Deep (Rock Harbor Series #3)
Abomination

Million Dollar Mystery Series

All five books in Mindy Starns Clark’s Million Dollar Mysteries are well written. This series main character, Callie, investigates nonprofit organizations to verify that the grant application reflects the truth. The grant money comes from her rich boss, Tom, whom Callie has never met. In each book Callie stumbles across a mystery while fulfilling her assignment.

The characters are easy to love. Learning about Tom only by his phone conversations with Callie keeps the story interesting (though they do meet in person before the series ends). Callie struggles with grief over her husband’s death are realistic and her courage in handling her emotions connects readers to her immediately. Tom helps Callie solve the mysteries and supports her in her activities.

The fast-paced plots of each book entertain. It’s refreshing to read a suspenseful book that tells the events from a Christian point of view. Callie approaches all of her assignments with integrity and honestly reports her findings. These books can be read numerous times, so don’t hesitate to purchase them.

Audiobooks:

A Penny for Your Thoughts

Don’t Take Any Wooden Nickels

A Dime a Dozen

A Quarter for a Kiss

The Buck Stops Here

Whispers of the Bayou

Whispers of the Bayou is Mindy Starns Clark’s first standalone mystery. Her other series are worth reading, too. They are the Million Dollar Mysteries and The Smart Chick Mysteries.

Miranda Miller is raised by her aunt. She thinks that her family in Louisiana is not interested in her. Miranda doesn’t have that many memories of her childhood before living with her aunt. The past comes alive for her when she returns to Louisiana at the request of the caretaker of her grandparent’s estate, Willy Pedreaux. Miranda’s career in art restoration works its way nicely into the story. She is able to preserve most of the artwork her grandmother painted on walls in the family home. Miranda does find out about her family and the reason behind decisions that were made for her when she was a child.

I enjoyed this book. It had many twists and surprises. I didn’t want to write too much about the story and give away the ending. The characters are vivid and the conversations between characters are interesting. The author does list the parts of the story that are based on fact on her website, www.mindystarnsclark.com. If you haven’t read any books by this author, you should give this one a read. In my opinion, she writes as well as other Christian fiction authors like Melody Carlson, Robin Jones Gunn, Dee Henderson, Susan May Warren, and Terri Blackstock.

Audiobook:

Whispers of the Bayou