The Body in the Sleigh: A Faith Fairchild Mystery (Faith Fairchild Mysteries, 18)

Faith Fairchild's pastor husband is recuperating from an illness, so the family decides to have a relaxing holiday at their place on Sanpere Island. Their vacation turns serious when Faith finds a dead body in an old sleigh. Added to this, a woman who raises goats on the island finds a baby in her manger. Faith begins an investigation to find answers to both puzzles and to see if they are connected in any way. The island is a delightful background for this Christmas story and, as usual the book contains recipes from Faith's catering service as well as a mystery to solve.

So nice to see Faith and family here on Sanpere in the winter, though I did miss Pix and their gang. I always delight in Katherine's descriptions of this area of Maine -- my own back yard. Having grown up in NYC, married and started a family outside of Boston. . . I've been "friends" with Faith for sometime time, looking forward to each new book as a special "treat," (figuratively as well as literally -- I've compiled my own recipe box of "Have Faith" concoctions!) I'm already anxiously awaiting the next "Body In The. . ." book, though I know it will unfortunately mean another murder -- it will also mean new recipes!

While I must admit I'm glad the Fairchilds evidently had about nine good Christmases (since The Body in the Boullion) during which Faith didn't find any bodies, I loved this account of their Christmas on Sanpere--with all the coziness of familiar friends and landscape and Faith's peerless cooking. Despite the familiarity, this book reads a bit differently from the rest of the series--I think because Mary Bethany and Miriam Carpenter are characters very close to the author's heart. She paints their portraits in detail usually reserved for Faith and her closest associates. They are more poignant characters, as well, with none of Faith's charmed life. (If tripping over bodies left and right can be part of a charmed life, rather than the cause of post-traumatic stress disorder.) Because of that, parts of the story are sadder than the other books; but it is filled with the great hope and redemption befitting a Christmas tale. Page succeeded brilliantly with this one!

Faith Fairchild and her family spend Christmas together at their cottage on Sanpere Island in Penobscot Bay, Maine. At a local store, Faith finds the corpse of a teen named Norah in an antique sleigh. She assumes the young girl died from an overdose as there are no visible marks on the girl, but the police suspect her boyfriend is her killer. On Christmas Eve goat farmer Mary Bethany calls Faith asking for help. Mary explains she has found a newborn boy with an enigmatic note and $50,000 inside her barn. While her husband the Reverend recovers from gallstone removal surgery, Faith searches for the biological mother. She locates college student Miriam whose boyfriend is a dealer. The amateur sleuth and the mom are in trouble from those who want both dead. This is an exciting Christmas mystery as Faith and her family celebrates the holiday season together by her investigating the homicide and the baby abandonment while her spouse recovers from surgery with good cheer from the brood especially the children. The story line is fast-paced with two underlying messages of the lucrative drug trafficking is everywhere as the economics supersedes the law and the ethics, and the Fairchild family wishing everyone a happy holiday season with recipes and good cheer to all. Harriet Klausner

It's holiday time and the Fairchild Family, Faith, Tom, Ben and Amy are spending it in their summer cottage on Sanpere Island on the coast of Maine. Maine you ask? In the middle of winter? That's just crazy. But, Tom is recuperating from major surgery and the family decides to go to their cottage where he can relax and have a pleasant, quiet recuperation. Still, just like Jessica Fletcher from Murder She Wrote, whenever Faith shows up anywhere, the dead bodies start to pile up. Although, things start out very quietly, family time together, watching ice boaters, snow shoeing in the woods and a lot of reading, things are about to happen. Faith takes the children to town one morning to take Christmas pictures in front of the Sanpere Historical Society. They had decorated an old sleigh with Christmas packages and a couple of manikins dressed up in antique costumes. But, as Faith is taking the pictures she notices that there are three manikins. And, the third figure turns out to be a dead body. The victim is Norah Taft, a young woman who had lived on Sanpere during the summer months and just recently had come back to live full time with her mother. She was apparently a drug addict and had committed suicide. Many people on the Island remembered her fondly and were very disturbed by her death. In the meantime, also on the island, a local woman, Mary Bethany, who raises goats comes upon a newborn baby boy in her barn on Christmas Eve. The only indications of his identity are a note asking Mary to raise the baby as well as a lot of cash. Mary asks Faith to help her find the identity of the baby's mother and during their investigation they find that the truth behind the child abandonment is connected somehow to Norah's death. This book is a page-turner. Ms. Page is wonderful as usual and ties everything up at the end with her usual talent. She is a great story teller and has won about every prize given to Mystery Authors. However, I've read all of her previous books about Faith Fairchild (17) and they all had a certain light-heartedness about them. This book is entirely different. It is much darker but the story is really excellent. The plots jump around a little but, if you read this author's books like I do you don't put it down long enough to get confused. Excellent job, Ms. Page. I'm so relieved you haven't decided to have Faith go after a group of vegetarian vampires. They are really getting old. Thanks for the great read.