Alpine Decoy: An Emma Lord Mystery

Having once lived in Monroe WA for a short time, and visited Stephens Pass on more than one occasion, I find it very easy to picture the area of Alpine in my mind. As a writer, I really like having a series that involves a small-town newspaper. I must confess I like this series much better than the author's other series set in a bed-and-breakfast in Seattle. I started this series just recently with one of the newer books, but was so intrigued by the characters that I went back to the beginning, and am working my way through the alphabet. What fun! I like everything about this series: the writing, the characters, the plotting. Also impressive is the author's willingness to tackle the subject of racism and prejudice in this small town, and in my opinion, she does it very well, indeed. It was obviously serendipity that brought me to this book just three days before the inauguration of our new president. I hope life proceeds as well for him as it does for Emma Lord, the owner/publisher of the Alpine Advocate. As for me, I'm off to find the next book in the series.

This fourth book of the Alpine series centers around Marilynn, a new nurse in town, who is African-American. She receives hate mail and is discriminated against in different ways. When two African-American males are killed in Alpine, people begin to suspect that Marilynn is connected with the crimes. Newspaper editor Emma Lord takes Marilynn under her wing and decides to protect her from slander and accusations of murder. Emma and her friends uncover some things about Marilynn's background which connect her to the victims, but Emma is convinced that she did not commit the murders. After a few red herrings, Emma finally discovers the truth. This is an enjoyable read, but it was difficult for me to believe that there would be this much discrimination in the 90's and a few loose ends were left at the end, such as who was sending Marilynn the hate mail. Despite these flaws, Daheim is always a good read.

After reading the complete Mrs. Pollifax series by Dorothy Gilman, I decided to give Mary Daheim and her Emma Lord mysteries a try. I have read Alpine Decoy and Alpine Escape so far, and I loved both of them. The books are hard to put down, mainly because of the suspense. The only downfall is how long it takes to get to the real "meat" of the story. If you like murder mysteries on the lighter side, this is a good series of books to go with.

I absolutely love this series. I can't wait to return to Alpine again