RINKER ON COLLECTIBLES — Column #1456

Copyright © Harry Rinker, LLC 2014

Winter Reads: Another Batch of Antiques and Collectibles Cozy Novels

When it came time to write my annual 2014 cozy antiques and collectibles “Summer Read” column, I had a problem.  First, only Barbara Allan, a joint pseudonym for short story writer and novelist Barbara Collins and mystery novelist Max Allan Collins, had published an antiques and collectibles cozy that I had not reviewed previously.  Jane Cleland and Lea Wait had titles in the works, but the titles were not due to be published until late fall.

Second, Barbara Allan and Jane Cleland explored new mediums for their characters.  Barbara Allan wrote two antiques and collectibles novelettes for sale only on Kindle.  Jane Cleland did a short story for “Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine.”  These are not available in bookstores.

Third, two antiques and collectibles cozy writers decided to give their characters a hiatus.  Gone missing are new titles in Sharon Fiffer’s “A Jane Wheel Mystery” series and Tamar Myers’s “A Den of Antiquity Mystery” series.  I identified closely with Jane Wheel, an antiques picker who loves garage and estate sales.  Although fiction, most of the novels were set in Kankakee, Illinois where Jane’s mother Nellie and father Don owned the EZ Way Inn.  Fiffer’s easy to read down-to-earth style was gimmick free.  The antiques and collectibles in her novels are low and middle market objects with which readers can easily identify and often lead to a “I had (or remember) one of those” memory.  Sharon and I email occasionally.  Thus far, she has been immune to my pleas to resurrect Jane Wheel.  I do not plan to stop asking.

Tamar Myers’s antiques and collectibles cozies are set in the Deep South.  Abigail Timberlake Washburn, who owned an antiques shop in Charlotte before moving to Charlestown, and her mother Mozella, a woman who is sane one moment and somewhat demented the next, are the main characters.  Myers made it clear to me when I interviewed her on WHATCHA GOT?, my syndicated antiques and collectibles call-in radio show, that she was moving on.  Abigail and Mozella are dead and buried.  The only way to resurrect these characters is to read one or more of the “Den of Antiquity Mystery” cozies still in print.  The same applies to the titles in Sharon Fiffer’s “A Jane Wheel Mystery” series.

Kensington Books published Barbara Allan’s “Antiques Con,” a title in “A Trash ‘n Treasury Mystery” series, in mid-summer.  This is the seventh (or eighth) title in the series depending on whether or not the Kindle novelettes are counted.  Brandy Borne, her mother Vivian, and Sushi, a Shih Tzu, are the main characters.  In the past, the stories have been set in Serenity, a small town on the banks of the Mississippi.  “Antiques Con” is set in New York, where Brandy, Vivian, and Sushi travel to a ComicCon to sell a 1930s Superman drawing found in a storage locker.  See “Antiques Disposal” for the background story.

Brandy is a drug-balanced divorcee more at home in her past than the present.  Vivian is an eccentric non-conformist.  The mother-daughter relationship is tense one moment and loving the next.

Barbara Allan writes the “A Trash ‘n’ Treasure Mystery series in the first person singular.  In the early novels, Brandy was the storyteller.  Eventually, Vivian wrote a chapter.  Now she writes two or more.  The tone is conversational.  “Antiques Con” also has an unusual feature.  The book begins with Chapter 2, the result of a dispute that erupted between Brandy and Vivian as to whether it should be included.  Readers who want to read Chapter 1 can do so by visiting www.barbaraallan.com.

I bought a Kindle to read Barbara Allan’s two novelettes: “Antiques Slay Ride” and “Antiques Flea Market.”  The only way I could justify the cost was to convince myself that I would download other titles to read during my travels.  Thus far, I have not done this.

“Antiques Slay Ride,” published on September 24, 2013, focuses on Brandy’s and Vivian’s attempt to purchase a collection of Christmas and Santa Claus memorabilia from a deceased collector, who they just happened to find dead in a sleigh that was the centerpiece of his display.  “Antique Fruitcake,” published on September 30, 2014, centers on events surrounding a murder at a dress rehearsal of a Christmas play that featured a fruitcake prop, baked by Vivian using the recipe from the defunct Serenity fruitcake plant.  This is one fruitcake that is palatable.  Writing for a new medium is a challenge for any writer.  Although “Antique Fruitcake” is better written and easier to digest, I recommend reading both titles.

Jane K. Cleland’s “Blood Rubies,” published by Minotaur Books, is the ninth book in “A Josie Prescott Antiques Mystery” series.  Josie Prescott, who owns Prescott’s, an auction, estate sale, appraisal service gallery in Rocky Point, New Hampshire, is the central character.  Do not look for Rocky Point on a map.  The town is fictional.

Cleland has surrounded Josie with a cast of characters including a skilled team of employees, a wide range of friends, and a rogue reporter name Wes.  The stories are told through Josie’s eyes and have a pleasant, semi-conversational tone.  Jane has chosen to import a corpse for this story (someone always has to die) rather than reduce the Rocky Point population by a body or two.

I love the “Josie Prescott Antiques Mystery” series because it shares insights into the operational methods of the antiques and collectibles trade little understood by the general public.  The novels also demonstrate the joys and frustrations of researching antiques and collectibles.

“Blood Rubies” caught me a bit off guard.  One of the objects featured in the story is a nineteenth century snow globe.  Having written a book about snow globes, I was unfamiliar with the type of snow globe that appeared in the story.  I asked Jane about this when I interviewed her on WHATCHA GOT?  When Jane told me the object was “fiction,” I breathed a sigh of relief.  For a brief period, I felt I missed an important piece of snow globe history.

Jane’s Josie Prescott novelette “Booked for Death” appeared in the January/February 2015 issue of the “Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine” (Volume 60, Nos. 1 and 2).  A copy is available by sending a check or money order for $9.50 to AHMM, 6 Prowitt Street, Suite 100, Norwalk, CT  06855 or by calling customer service at 1-800-220-7443.  This is a must read for a bibliophile and antiquarian book collector.  The story is well developed and stands alone, albeit reading one of the novels first will help the reader understand the characters better.

When Lea Wait’s “Shadows on a Cape Cod Wedding,” the sixth novel in the “‘Shadows’ Antique Print Mystery” series ended, it was clear the next title would focus on Christmas. “Shadows on a Maine Christmas,” published by Perseverance Press/John Daniel & Company, is set in Waymouth, Maine.  Heroine Maggie Summers, who lives in New Jersey, is spending Christmas with Will, her fiance, and his Aunt Nettie.  Will asked Maggie to marry him in “Shadows on a Cape Cod Wedding,” but she did not give him an answer. A description of a print introduces each chapter.  Antiques are worked into the story peripherally through visits to museums and antique shops.

One the principal tenets of cozy mysteries is that main characters are single.  While there is always a boy friend, often a member of law enforcement, the male is not involved in solving the crime.  Married heroines are an anomaly.  I finished “Shadows on a Maine Christmas” feeling the antiques and collectibles cozy community had lost another old favorite.  However, in an email exchange, Lea Wait informed me that there will be at least one more “‘Shadows’ Antique Print Mystery,” but not for another two years.

Meanwhile Lea has launched “A Mainely Needlepoint Mystery” series with the central focus being antique and modern needlework.  Angie (Angel) Curtis has been called home to Harbor Haven by her Grandmother Charlotte.  The body of Angel’s mother, which has been missing for several decades, suddenly appeared.  “Twisted Threads,” published by Kensington Publishing Company, tells the story of Charlotte’s creation of a handcraft needlework business known as Mainely Needlepoint and the mystery surrounding the death of the business’s independent representative and Angel’s mother.   Antique needlework is woven into the story line throughout the novel and in the chapter introductions.

Rinker Enterprises and Harry L. Rinker are on the Internet.  Check out www.harryrinker.com.

You can listen and participate in WHATCHA GOT?, Harry’s antiques and collectibles radio call-in show, on Sunday mornings between 8:00 AM and 10:00 AM Eastern Time.  If you cannot find it on a station in your area, WHATCHA GOT? streams live and is archived on the Internet at www.gcnlive.com.

SELL, KEEP OR TOSS?  HOW TO DOWNSIZE A HOME, SETTLE AN ESTATE, AND APPRAISE PERSONAL PROPERTY (House of Collectibles, an imprint of the Random House Information Group, $17.99), Harry’s latest book, is available at your favorite bookstore and via www.harryrinker.com.