Book Review: The Alpine Nemesis

Reviewed By: Harriet Klausner

The Alpine Nemesis     Amazon US PB Amazon Canada PB
Mary Daheim
Class/Genre:   Mystery   Amateur Sleuth   Woman Main Character   Cozy
Series: Emma Lord # 14
Fawcett, Oct 2001, $6.99, 320 pp.

Hard news is scarce in the small town of Alpine, Washington. This forces Emma Lord, owner and publisher of the weekly Alpine Advocate, to scramble to find a lead story for the front page. She thinks she’s going to have to settle for putting a story about public toilets coming to Alpine, but thinks that stinks as a headliner.

Soon the biggest story to hit the small town starts breaking. The Hartquists and the O’Neills have been feuding for generations, but nobody expected that the remaining Hartquists would kill the three O’Neill brothers and put them in the butcher’s freezer. Emma gets the scoop and her front page story thinking that all that’s left is to watch the Hartquists react during the trial. However, the story is just beginning and the subsequent events that take place in the pretty bucolic town will change Emma’s life forever.

THE ALPINE NEMESIS is an exciting small town mystery starring a likable heroine and a fully developed cast of characters. Readers are given an inside look into small town living and how to run a weekly periodical. This is not a straightforward mystery but a tale with so many layers that, in actuality, it is a complex and totally absorbing read.

Harriet Klausner

Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Harriet Klausner