Shear Trouble by Elizabeth Craig

Shear Trouble by Elizabeth Craig ISBN-13: 9780451469502 Mass Market Paperback: 304 pages Publisher: Obsidian Mystery Released: August 5, 2014

Source: Review copy from the publisher.

Book Description from the Back Cover:
The Village Quilters of Dappled Hills, North Carolina, are desperate to finish their quilts before an upcoming show. To help, fellow member Posy has opened the back room of her shop, the Patchwork Cottage, for everyone to use. But the ladies are less than thrilled when Phyllis Stitt and Martha Helmsley—members of their rival quilting guild, the Cut-Ups—ask to join them.

Phyllis is hoping to leave the Cut-Ups and join up with the Village Quilters now that Martha’s dating her ex-fiancé, Jason Gore. She’s not pleased when he visits the shop and even more upset when her new shears disappear. After offering to search for them, Beatrice discovers Jason with the shears buried in his unfaithful heart. Now she must sharpen her sleuthing skills to find a killer before someone else’s life is cut short.…


My Review:
Shear Trouble is a cozy mystery. It's the fourth in a series. You don't need to have read the previous novels to understand this one, and the previous whodunits aren't spoiled in this novel.

The main characters were interesting and nice enough, but I had some problems with the mystery. The clues were basically from the heroine asking good questions and getting answers. We're told that a certain person was in the shop, yet later that person was never in the shop. This was a writing mistake, not a character lying (as far as I can tell--pages 216 and 250). I felt like I couldn't trust the clues.

Next, our heroine tells the detective everything she discovers...until she learns that a critical phone call was placed at a certain location. This could be the big break if the detective discovers who the call was made to! But the heroine decides to stay quiet and hope that the very shy gal will change her mind and go tell the police about this major lead. Which she doesn't.

At the end, the heroine has just figured out whodunit when of course whodunit arrives at her house. The heroine is scared whodunit will kill her, yet she lets whodunit inside and asks unnecessary questions that make it clear she knows whodunit is involved in the murder. Er, duh, bad idea. And the heroine has two dogs that are growling at whodunit as they know whodunit is a danger, yet whodunit opens the house door and...the dogs dash outside so they can growl at whodunit from the other side of the door? Huh?

There was no sex or bad language.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.


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