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Worth Its Weight in OLD: A Karen Maxwell Mystery

K.D. Hays
Heartsong Presents - Mysteries (2008)
ISBN 9781602601314
Reviewed by Enid Grabiner for RebeccasReads (10/09)

Karen Maxwell, divorced mother of two, delves into her second foray as a private investigator for her brother Dave’s company.  Sick of office management duties, she relishes the opportunity to probe into a case for an antique dealer whose gallery has been vandalized.  Items of furniture are broken and paintings have been cut.  Karen goes undercover as a salesclerk at the Blue Moon Art and Antiques Gallery in order to inspect the scene and the employees.  Her suspicions become heightened as she gets to know Vicki, a noticeably wealthy young clerk who is overly concerned with the arrangement and rearrangement of the paintings in the store, and Eric, the strange young porter who is so obviously besot with Vicki.  Even the owners’ actions become suspect.

Trying to balance the investigation of the defaced items along with her duties at Dave’s office, her responsibilities as a mother and her relationship with new boyfriend Brian leaves Karen in a state of chaos.  Brian appears to be more focused on rehearsals for his church youth group play than on her. Her own kids are surly.  Dave has hired a new office manager who is incompetent and is creating havoc in the workplace.  Compounding all of that, the owners of the gallery fire Karen because her progress is so slow.  She however is determined to solve the case and keep the rest of her life control.

This is an easy fast read with a very minimal mystery.  It is infused with remarks that are corny and forced rather than witty, diminishing the narrative.  Hays’s strength does lie in the very realistic confrontations between Karen and her children. They seem very genuine. Also bothersome are religious references to the goodness of God and his works which seem inappropriate and superfluous to the story.


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