Bindweed: A Gardening Mystery

This was the best yet from this author. From start to finish it held me captive. Read it in 2 days! Will we get any more of Bretta Soloman from this author??? Hope so, if this is any indication of what the caliber of the book will be.

Janis Harrison has put together a gardening mystery series that makes me wish I had "the touch" for flowers -- arranging or growing. Ms. Harrison certainly has the touch for writing wonderful books. I actually read "Bindweed" first. Loved it! So I sought out her other books and read those in order. Well, I did not believe it but I am so bonded to Bretta and her household and her flower shop -- and, of course, Bailey! (I hold a special place in my heart for Carl.) If Bretta had a dog or a cat I would probably love him or her also. I even love the SUV (but glad that she is footing the fuel bills). This is just an absolutely wonderful series and I can hardly wait for more from Janis Harrison.

In River City, Missouri, before she passed away from a terminal illness, Agnes Sutton arranged with the Hawthorne Street shopkeepers to hire her brain damaged son Toby to do odd jobs for them so that he can remain somewhat independent. Though only mentally functioning like a child, Toby is a dedicated helper doing his chores diligently like washing store windows and taking out the trash. Thus when Bretta Solomon, owner of the flower shop, learns that her conscientious helper died from hornet bites, she takes it personally perhaps because her late spouse Carl was a deputy sheriff. Bretta wonders why anyone would kill the harmless Toby by planting the deadly nest inside his room. The only possible motive she can think of must be Agnes' odd-looking flowers that someone stole from the deceased woman's garden. She ponders whether these flowers can be valuable enough for someone to REAP A WICKED HARVEST that led to murder. She ivestigates while also slowing down her romance with a neighbor and coping with her father's thirty-something squeeze wanting to redesign her home. This is a terrific amateur sleuth tale in which the clues are discovered by the heroine in a reasonable but clever manner. The support cast provides the eccentricities of small town living specially Bretta's battling assistants Lew and Lois who argue over everything even that critical 1960s question of Superman or Spiderman and her father with his "designer girlfriend" who becomes her cohort in sleuthing. Readers will enjoy the latest Gardening Mystery. Harriet Klausner