Title: A Bone To Pick
Publisher: Berkley Crime
Publish Date: January 1, 1992
Buy: Amazon
Book Blurb: Going to two weddings—one of a former lover—and a funeral for a member of her disbanded crime study club keeps Aurora “Roe” Teagarden quite busy for a few months. Unfortunately, her personal life seems to be at a standstill—until her fortunes unexpectedly change.
After the funeral Roe learns that Jane Engle, the deceased, has named her as heir to a rather substantial estate, which includes money, jewelry, and a house complete with a skull hidden in a window seat. Knowing Jane, Roe concludes that the elderly woman has purposely left her a murder to solve. So she must identify the victim and figure out which one of Jane’s ordinary-seeming neighbors is a murderer—without putting herself in deadly danger...
Review: I started reading this series, because in a fit of boredom watched The Julius House on Hallmark. I've been slowly trying to make my way through the series, which as I have expected is similar yet different and some of the changes made in the movies made me shake my head.
Roe starts out at the wedding of her ex and then ends up at a funeral of friend from the "Real Murders" group which has now disbanded. This friend has left her quite an inheritance. She also left her a skull in her new home and a mystery to solve.
This is where I start wondering about this series. This book is really about Roe and not so much about finding out anything about the skull she finds in the window seat of her new home. There's no investigating at all.
One of the things that really got me was how Roe felt she was rich when she inherited $500,000. Yes, that's a lot of money, but even by early 90s standards it wouldn't be enough to make you feel you are rich. She makes some decisions that make me question how smart she is.
In the first 2/3 of the book, Roe's mom is on her honeymoon, when she returns, I realized what an intensely unlikable person she is. For a woman with a great career of her own, she really focuses on her daughter's marital status, rather than helping her find her way in the world. Roe is, after all, a part-time librarian.
Roe is the typical low self esteem heroine. What I find I don't like about her, is how she feels she must have a husband to be complete and this theme continue throughout the book, as you see her start a new relationship and start to screw it up at a bbq to welcome her to the neighborhood.
I think Aubrey seems like a nice sort, but it is easy to see early on, that he isn't going to be the guy for Roe, especially as he's an episcopal minister.
The best part of this book involves Madeline the cat and her kittens.
The mystery was solved so quickly and without any real indication that anything was going on.
This book wasn't even 300 pages long and yet nothing really happened, and yet I'm going to move on to the next book.
Rating: 2 flowers
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