Checking out a kid's summer camp, Jane and Shelly discover the body of a victim who had been killed with a heavy-duty skillet, but things turn bizarre when the body disappears and the victim reappears, alive. 25,000 first printing. - (Baker & Taylor)
Checking out a kid's summer camp, Jane and Shelly discover the body of a victim who was killed with a heavy-duty skillet, but things turn bizarre when the body disappears and the victim reappears, alive - (Baker & Taylor)
Jill Churchill's smart and savvy amateur sleuth, Jane Jeffry, is a busy young suburban single mom with an amazing talent for solving the most mind-boggling of murders.
Jane isn't exactly thrilled about heading off into the wilds of Wisconsin with her best friend Shelley to check out a summer camp for city kids. Shelley promises that their rustic "vacation" won't include climbing cliffs, crawling through swamps or challenging Mother Nature. But no one warned them about a lack of electricity, ranting from a local loony annoyed by the intrusion, and the natural wonder of a cookout in the cold rain. After the soggy supper, Jane and Shelley head back to the remote campsite in search of Jane's lost watch. That's when they discover someone has used a heavy-duty frying pan to cook up a most distasteful murder. The victim's head has been bashed in and the culinary weapon left lying on the ground - but not for long. By the time the crime is reported, the ingredients have mysteriously vanished, and the women's credibility is seriously questioned. And when the "corpse" shows up, alive and well, without so much as a bump on the head, Jane decides she'd better investigate before she's suspected of having a problem with her own head...and before someone gets away with a most bizarre recipe for murder. - (Blackwell North Amer)
Booklist Reviews
In this third Jane Jeffry mystery, Jane and her friend, Shelley Nowack, are deep in the cold and rainy Wisconsin woods with a committee inspecting a possible summer camp for their suburban Illinois school district. On the first night at the camp, Jane and Shelley find one of their colleagues bludgeoned to death with a skillet. After they report the murder, the body vanishes, and the victim reappears--alive and well. The duo start investigating, hoping to dispel their fellow committee members' doubts about their sanity. The solution to the mystery is hidden in the characters' pasts, and the narrative occasionally bogs down as Churchill doles out all the necessary biographical details. Nevertheless, this is a pleasant, hard-to-solve mystery, with evocative autumnal atmosphere (a good Halloween read), lively writing, and often humorous dialogue. The murder, mayhem, and bad weather have the added benefit of making even your worst camping trip seem like a garden party. ((Reviewed October 1, 1997))Copyright 2000 Booklist Reviews
