Clare O'Donohue

Another beautifully written, well thought, and plotted cozy.
I went into this wondering how I was going to stay awake reading about the obviously boring subject of quilting in New England. I was already stifling a yawn when suddenly the skeleton showed up and suddenly no one in the town of Archers Rest was boring anymore.
O’Donohue carefully manipulates the small town folklore with the modern day gossips, and using the cliff-hanger approach leaves us at the end of each chapter with a little show more tidbit of new information that makes you have to read just one more chapter.
Nell, grand-daughter of the towns quilting shop owner, Eleanor, is the town’s nosy snoop. She gains a little insider information into the curious goings on in town through pillow talk; her boy-friend in the town’s police chief. When the skeleton is discovered in the grandmother’s rose garden she has to fight to defend Eleanor from the rumors that she was the murderer. It turns out that everyone in town is harboring a secret and one-by-one Nell overturns the rock that everyone has hidden that secret under.
When she receives written threats on her own safety, and discovers that someone is secretly following her around town Nell turns up the heat. Not known for her tact, she treads on more than one person’s toes on her way to the undeniable truth. When an attack on the niece of the dead man leaves her unconscious, lying in a pool of blood, the amateur sleuth realizes that the murderer is still alive.
In the fashion of a modern day Jane Marple on steroids, Nell puts together the final piece of the puzzle just in time to stage the quilting display for the town carnival and have the suspect arrested simultaneously. show less

O’Donohue puts her journalistic skills to work building her new character, Kate Conway, a Chicago television reporter and begins her second series with a rollicking good start.
Conway produces one of those true crime local cable shows and is used to dealing with dead bodies and missing people but when the dead body is her soon-to-be divorced husband who just happens to die while she is starting up a fledgling new show on finding missing people then local homicide detectives find cause to show more question her motives and alibi.
Throw into the mix the husband’s new fiancé, who all of a sudden wants to be Kat’s new ‘best friend’, a old high school jock friend and unhappy in-laws Kate finds her personal life as much as a juggling act as the new television show. When the body of the girl she is reporting on as missing shows up and Kate starts to receive death threats of her own she has to figure out is the hidden danger from the results of her reporting or from someone a little closer to her personal life.
O’Donohue exhibits a masterful approach with her classic red-herrings and carefully placed foreshadowing as she drags us through the muck-racking of yellow journalism but still finds a way to keep as close as family when worrying about her protagonist. This novel kept me interested and still left room for unexpected twist in the end. This will be a series worth collecting. show less

Got a copy at Malice Domestic and just read it as we have a family trip to Ireland this July. I'll definitely recommend it to the folks going as it's a fun romp through Ireland by a couple of Americans. It reminded me a bit of Hitchcock's 39 Steps, and some of his other plots where some innocents get pulled into a spy adventure without really understanding what's going on. You like the couple who have a believable relationship and the setting is gorgeous. Definitely a fun read!

Nell Fitzgerald is thrilled when she receives a gorgeous handmade quilt in a lover’s knot pattern from her grandmother Eleanor as an engagement gift. Her joy is short-lived, however, when her fiance announces he’s calling off the wedding. Heartbroken, 25-year-old Nell flees New York City for her grandmother’s home in quaint Archers Rest. In this small town Eleanor’s life revolves around her quilt shop, Someday Quilts, and the members of the shop’s quilting circle. When the body of show more a local handyman known for his flirting is found in the quilt shop, murdered with a pair of quilting scissors, Nell finds herself drawn into the case–and drawn to the handsome police chief. As a pattern of clues begins to emerge, one of the prime suspects is Nell’s ex-fiance, whose arrival in Archers Rest seems suspicious. The ladies of the quilting circle continue to piece together their quilts as Nell unravels the mystery.

I enjoyed the book but didn’t love it. The whole romance thing between Nell, her ex-fiancee Ryan and the police chief, Jesse, was all pretty predictable.

Stop here if you don’t want any spoilers.

Who the killer was surprised me but the way they treat Nancy is so unrealistic. Hello? She murdered a guy. Even if she thought he stole her money he didn’t have the scissors raised upright so it’s hard to imagine that he was going to try and hurt her. Then the other quilting club members act like it’s no big deal that she killed a guy other than oh darn. In addition, a police officer letting a civilian continue with all the things Nell did seems pretty unbelievable as well. Jesse kept threatening to arrest Nell but never did. I would think in real life a cop would because she was seriously intervening in the investigation and might have messed up any evidence that could convict the murderer. Even in small towns would they be this lenient?

I know it doesn’t matter but I also wonder what the deal was between Ryan and Amanda. Did they have a one night stand? An affair? Did they love each other? Anyway, it was a quick fun read as long as you don’t focus on it being realistic. show less