Overbooked specializes in providing timely information about fiction (all genres) and readable nonfiction. Overbooked has been online since 1994. Overbooked is a work in progress . . .
Antiques Crime Fiction Booklist
Page Modified: June 1, 2007
Mysteries set in the world of antiques.
A list of books, some of which received at least one starred review (indicating a work of unusual merit) from the following review sources: Booklist (BL), Publisher's Weekly (PW), Kirkus, and Library Journal (LJ). Additional titles of interest may be included on this list. Titles are alphabetically by author.
Annotations are from Advance, the Ingram Book Magazine, unless noted.- Savanah Blues
Author: Andrews, Mary Kay
Publisher: HarperCollins $ 24.95 ISBN: 006019958X Date: 2002
Landing a catch like Talmadge Evans III got Eloise "Weezie" Foley a big house in Savannah's historic district. Divorcing him got her booted into the carriage house in the backyard. Tal, meanwhile, lives with his girlfriend, elegant Caroline DeSantos, in the mansion Weezie lovingly restored. Dirty deals are simmering all around her, just as Weezie discovers how very delicious love can be--the second time around. Andrews is a former antiques picker.
Updated 5.18.05 - Hissy Fit
Author: Andrews, Mary Kay
Publisher: HarperCollins $ 24.95 ISBN: 0060564644 Date: 2004
LJ
Welcome to the wonderful world of bestselling author Mary Kay Andrews, where the bourbon is cold, the manners are genteel, and a cheating varmint of an ex-fianc gets the comeuppance he so richly deserves. Andrews is a former antiques picker.
Updated 7.13.04 - Killer Stuff
Author: Fiffer, Sharon
Publisher: Minotaur $ 23.95 ISBN: 0312278187 Date: 2001
Recently been laid off from her PR job, separated from her husband, and facing a midlife crisis, Jane Wheel makes ends meet by foraging for antiques at suburban Chicago estate sales. When she stumbles upon the body of her neighbor Sandy, Jane finds herself as the prime suspect. With the help of her best friend and a Chicago police detective, Jane goes after the truth.
Updated 5.26.05 - Dead Guy's Stuff
Author: Fiffer, Sharon
Publisher: Minotaur $ 24.95 ISBN: 0312278225 Date: 2002
In this delightful follow-up to Fiffer's debut, Killer Stuff, antique "picker" Jane Wheel uncovers a gruesome memento of murder at a suburban Chicago estate sale.
Updated 5.26.05 - The Wrong Stuff
Author: Fiffer, Sharon
Publisher: Minotaur $ 24.95 ISBN: 0312314140 Date: 2005
call from detective Bruce Oh asking for help on a homicide promises a new career direction for antiques picker Jane Wheel. But when she learns the identity of the accused--antiques dealer Claire Oh, wife of her new partner--the trail leads to imminent danger.
Updated 5.26.05 - Buried Stuff
Author: Fiffer, Sharon
Publisher: Minotaur $ 23.95 ISBN: 03122314167 Date: 2005
Jane Wheel unearths a corpse in the fourth installment of Fiffer's charming Antiques Picker mystery series.
Updated 5.26.05 - The Judas Pair
- Gold From Gemini
- The Grail Tree
- Spend Game
- The Vatican Rip
- Firefly Gadroon
- The Sleeper of Erin
- The Gondola Scam
- Pearlhanger
- The Tartan Ringers
- Moonspender
- Jade Woman
- The Very Last Gambado
- The Great California Game
- The Lies of Fair Ladies
- Paid and Loving Eyes
- The Sin Within Her Smile
- The Grace in Older Women
- The Possessions of a Lady
- The Rich and the Profane
- A Rag a Bone and a Hank of Hair
- Every Last Cent
- Ten Word Game
- The Rich and the Profane
Author: Gash, Jonathan
Publisher: Viking $ 22.95 ISBN: 0312093616 Date: 1999
Booklist PW
The 20th mystery of this series finds Lovejoy Antiques, Inc., in a spot of bailiff trouble and the rascally sleuth himself embroiled in a riot of holy hanky-panky, antique dealing, and a devilish murder.
Updated 5.26.05 - The Ten Word Game
Author: Gash, Jonathan
Publisher: Minotaur $ 23.95 ISBN: 0312323476 Date: 2004
Booklist
Lovejoy cannot be said to have clean hands and a pure heart. In The Ten Word Game, Lovejoy is hiding out from the law in a port city far from London. By a ruse, he is shanghaied aboard a cruise ship on its way to Russia. There a group of schemers feed him well, but hold him prisoner because they need his talents for their daring plan.
Updated 1.6.04 - The Grenadillo Box
Author: Gleeson, Janet
Publisher: Simon & Schuster $ 25 ISBN: 0743246861 Date: 2004
Booklist
The debut novel from the bestselling author of The Arcanum transports readers to 18th century Georgian England for an intricate, romantic tale of murder and intrigue.
Suggested Reading: Fiction & Mystery Debuts
Updated 11.25.03 - The Moche Warrior
Author: Hamilton, Lyn
Publisher: Prime Crime $ 21.95 ISBN: 0425168093 Date: 1999
When Toronto antiques dealer Lara McClintoch finds herself in possession of authentic artifacts of the Moche--an ancient people predating the Incas--she soon realizes she is an unwitting link in a chain of black-market collectors. Now she must journey to Peru and do battle with an army of grave robbers.
Updated 5.26.05 - The Celtic Riddle
Author: Hamilton, Lyn
Publisher: Prime Crime $ 21.95 ISBN: 042517235x Date: 2000
Antique dealer and sleuth Lara McClintoch accompanies her employee to County Kerry, Ireland, for the reading of an old friend's will. Eamon Byrne left each of his heirs a clue -- a piece of a puzzle that leads to a mysterious treasure. When Lara discovers the ancient Celtic poem that serves as the key, she closes in on the treasure.
Updated 5.26.05 - The African Quest
Author: Hamilton, Lyn
Publisher: Prime Crime $ 21.95 ISBN: 0425178064 Date: 2001
Toronto antiques store co-owner Lara McClintock is leading an antiques and archaeology tour to Tunisia. Lara's group sails into trouble when the story of a Carthaginian merchant ship that sank 2,000 years ago stirs up one person's murderous interest in finding the priceless artifacts that went down with it.
Updated 5.26.05 - The Etruscan Chimera
Author: Hamilton, Lyn
Publisher: Prime Crime $ 22.95 ISBN: 0425184633 Date: 2002
Lara McClintoch extends her European antiquing tour when she's commissioned to buy a certain Etruscan sculpture. But when the sculpture's owner is found dead, Lara must search for that most precious rarity--someone she can trust.
Updated 5.26.05 - The Thai Amulet
Author: Hamilton, Lyn
Publisher: Prime Crime $ 22.95 ISBN: 0425190064 Date: 2003
Toronto shopkeeper Lara McClintoch must sift through the layers of Bangkok society to find a fellow antique dealer--alive or dead.
Updated 5.26.05 - The Magyar Venus
Author: Hamilton, Lyn
Publisher: Prime Crime $ 22.95 ISBN: 0425190064 Date: 2004
After the unveiling of the Magyar Venus, an ancient head and torso of a woman carved from mammoth ivory, a friend of antiques dealer Lara McClintoch commits suicide. Tracing the Venus's provenance to Budapest, Lara discovers a truth that arises from the secrets of the past.
Updated 5.26.05 - The Moai Murders
Author: Hamilton, Lyn
Publisher: Prime Crime $ 22.95 ISBN: 0425200442 Date: 2005
At once erudite and entertaining, these jaunty whodunits tag along after Lara McClintock, a Toronto antiques dealer whose quest for ancient artifacts takes her everywhere from Africa to Ireland."--"New York Times."
Updated 5.26.05 - Stealing with Style
Author: Jenkins, Emyl
Publisher: Algonquin $ 22.95 ISBN: 1565124456 Date: 2005
Booklist
Antiques appraiser Jenkins turns her talents to fiction in the first of a series of mysteries that follow the heroine behind the scenes of the sometimes murky world of antiques, sophisticated scammers, and shifty associates.
Suggested Reading: Debuts | Antiques Mysteries
Updated 5.9.05 - The Salaryman's Wife
Author: Massey, Sujata
Publisher: HarperCollins $ 5.99 ISBN: 0061044431 Date: 1997
Agatha Best First Novel Winner | Anthony Nominee Best Paperback Original | Macavity Nominee Best First Novel
Rei Shimura is a 27-year-old English teacher living in one of Tokyo's
seediest neighborhoods. She doesn't make much money, but she wouldn't
go back home to California even if she had a free ticket. Her independence
is shaken, however, when a getaway to an ancient castle town is marred
by the murder of the beautiful wife of a high-powered business. Rei
suspects the police aren't looking in the right places, so she does.
And she manages to piece together a strange, ever-changing puzzle -
one that is built on lies and held together by years of sex and deception.
Updated 5.26.05 - Zen Attitude
Author: Massey, Sujata
Publisher: HarperCollins $ 5.99 ISBN: 006104444X Date: 1998
Edgar Nominee Best Paperback Original | Anthony Nominee Best Paperback Original
In this smart and snappy sequel to the acclaimed The Salaryman's Wife, rising mystery master Sujata Massey brings back Tokyo-based treasure hunter Rei Shimura in another tale of secrets, lies and murder.
Updated 5.26.05 - The Flower Master
Author: Massey, Sujata
Publisher: HarperCollins Price: $ 24 ISBN: 0060192283 Date: 1999
Kirkus
Rei Shimura is a half-American, half-Japanese antiques dealer who's all sleuth when it comes to crime. At her aunt's bidding, Rei signs up for a course in Japanese flower arranging, but before she's even finished her first lesson, one of her teachers is brutally murdered. - The Floating Girl
Author: Massey, Sujata
Publisher: HarperCollins $ 24 ISBN: 0060192291 Date: 2000
Booklist Editors' Choice
Japanese-American writer Rei Shimura finally feels at home in Tokyo. Working on an article about the history of comic book art, her story turns when the creator of a comic book, which reveals the social milieu of pre-World War II Japan, is found dead. Rei finds herself floating through Japan's youth underground to get the story--and save her own skin. A Mystery Guild Selection.
Updated 5.26.05 - The Bride's Kimona
Author: Massey, Sujata
Publisher: HarperCollins $ 25 ISBN: 0060199334 Date: 2001
Agatha Nominee Best Novel
An antiques business owner finds herself involved with stolen artifacts, a wacky group of Japanese tourists and one very dead body when she transports a set of priceless kimonos.
Updated 5.26.05 - The Samurai's Daughter
Author: Massey, Sujata
Publisher: HarperCollins $ 24.95 ISBN: 0066212901 Date: 2003
The sixth book in the Agatha and Macavity Award-winning mystery series is a witty and suspenseful story that takes its young sleuth into the world of war reparations and family secrets.
Updated 5.26.05 - The Pearl Diver
Author: Massey, Sujata
Publisher: HarperCollins $ 24.95 ISBN: 0066212960 Date: 2004
Agatha Nominee Best Novel
The latest book in the Agatha and Macavity Award-winning mystery series finds the young and wily sleuth, Rei Shimura, searching for missing women in Washington, D.C.
Updated 5.26.05 - The Girl at the End of the Line
Author: Mathes, Charles
Publisher: St Martins $ 22.95 ISBN: 0312198876 Date: 1999
After discovering an old playbill featuring their grandmother on the cover, Nell and Molly O'Hara are determined to find out more, but when the old woman turns up dead in the nursing home, their schoolgirl adventure becomes a fullblown mystery.
Updated 5.26.05 - The Girl in the Face of the Clock
Author: Mathes, Charles
Publisher: St Martins $ 23.95 ISBN: 0312268955 Date: 2001
Updated 5.26.05 - Double Dealer: A Bert and Nan Tatum Mystery
Author: McCafferty, Barbara Taylor & Herald, Beverly Taylor
Publisher: Kensington $ 20 ISBN: 1575665077 Date: 2000
Mystery's most engaging set is at it again, and crime doesn't stand half a chance. This time out, they're about to discover that antiquing can be murder. Nan and Bert are wandering the flea market shopping for each other's birthday gifts, when cantankerous antiques dealer Franklin Haggerty winds up with a tag on his toe. To make matters worse, Bert's daughter Ellie and her boyfriend, Chris, are the prime murder suspects. Delving into the world of vintage curios, the twins assemble a list of eccentrics with the means and the motive to kill Haggerty -- including his oddly merry widow! - Publisher Marketing.
Updated 5.26.05 - Death is a Caberet: Antique Lover's Mysteries
Author: Morgan, Deborah
Publisher: Prime Crime $ 5.99 ISBN: 0425182029 Date: 2001
Former FBI agent Jeff Talbot, a professional antiques picker, is forced to draw on his old crime-solving skills when a priceless French cabaret set, commissioned by Napoleon for Josephine, goes up for auction and rival collectors start turning up dead.
Updated 5.26.05 - The Weedless Widow: Antique Lover's Mysteries
Author: Morgan, Deborah
Publisher: Prime Crime$ 5.99 ISBN: 042518689X Date: 2002
When his fishing buddy, Bill Rhodes, is murdered and his lure collection stolen, former FBI agent and antiques expert Jeff Talbot tracks the lures to an online auction site, but when he gets closer, Talbot's agoraphobic wife is abducted.
Updated 5.26.05 - Four on the Floor: Antique Lover's Mysteries
Author: Morgan, Deborah
Publisher: Prime Crime $ 5.99 ISBN: 0425198863 Date: 2004
Former FBI agent Jeff Talbot discovers four dead men and an envelope of clues linking his own family to the "Four on the Floor" murders. Now, he must go undercover to catch the killer--without becoming the fifth on the floor.
Updated 5.26.05 - Edwin of the Iron Shoes
Author: Muller, Marcia
Publisher: David McKay $ 7.95 ISBN: 0679507825 Date: 1977
When an elderly antiques dealer is murdered, Muller's popular P.I. Sharon McCone follows a killer's trail to a museum where San Francisco's most elegant socialites gather. "Muller and McCone are still the class of the field".--San Diego Union-Tibune.
Updated 5.26.05
Tamar Myers cozy Den of Antiquity series features sleuth Abby Timberlake. The series is listed in order of publication, with a few titles highlighted below the list.
- Larceny and Old Lace
- Gilt by Association
- The Ming and I
- So Faux, So Good
- Baroque and Desperate
- Estate of Mind
- A Penny Earned
- Nightmare in Shining Armor
- Splendor in the Glass
- Tiles and Tribulations
- Statue of Limitations
- Monet Talks
- Tiles and Tribulations
Author: Myers, Tamar
Publisher: Avon $ 6.99 ISBN: Date: 2003
Charleston antiques dealer/amateur sleuth Abigail Timberlake Washburn reluctantly attends a seance at her friend C.J.'s newly-bought fixer-upper. When the psychic who conducts the seance is forced to the other side prematurely, Abby leaps into action.
Updated 5.26.05 - Monet Talks
Author: Myers, Tamar
Publisher: Avon $ 6.99 ISBN: 0060535172 Date: 2005
When a birdnapper demands a priceless painting as ransom for a stolen, mouthy mynah bird--and then abducts Abby Timberlake Washburn's mother as well--the antiques dealer-sleuth races to the rescue.
Updated 5.26.05 - The Body in the Basement
Author: Page, Katherine Hall
Publisher: St Martins $ 20.95 ISBN: 0312114702 Date: 1994
Yankee recipes, elderly quilters, Down East antiques--and a dead body--combine to make a cozy summer on a Maine island for young mother/minister's wife/sleuth Faith Fairchild.
Updated 5.26.05 - The Body in the Bookcase
Author: Page, Katherine Hall
Publisher: Morrow $ 22.95 ISBN: 0688157475Date: 1998
Faith Fairchild is busy arranging the details of a society wedding. While making some parish calls, she discovers the body of elderly Sarah Winslow. The house has been ransacked and Faith is determined to find the burglars responsible for Sarah's death.
Updated 5.26.05 - Shadows at the Fair: An Antique Print Mystery
Author: Wait, Lea
Agatha Nominee Best First Novel
Publisher: Scribner $ 24 ISBN: 0743225538 Date: 2002
Written by a fourth generation antiques dealer, this debut mystery series crackles with suspense, intrigue, and authenticity as it brings together antique prints and unexplained homicides.
Updated 5.26.05 - Shadows on the Coast of Main: An Antique Print Mystery
Author: Wait, Lea
Publisher: Scribner $ 24 ISBN: 0743225546 Date: 2003
A spooky house, a gorgeous Maine setting, and some fascinating antique prints provide the perfect ingredients for a riveting new mystery in the series that "beckons like a weekend in the country" ("The New York Times").
Updated 5.26.05 - Shadows on the Ivy: An Antique Print Mystery
Author: Wait, Lea
Publisher: Scribner $ 24 ISBN: 074324950x Date: 2004
Maggie Summer--professor, antique dealer, and sleuth--returns in a spirited and suspenseful new installment in the Agatha-nominated series that "beckons like a weekend in the country" ("The New York Times Book Review").
Updated 5.26.05 - Shadows at the Spring Show: An Antique Print Mystery
Author: Wait, Lea
Publisher: Scribner $ 24 ISBN: 0743249518 Date: 2005
Antique print expert Lea Wait probes difficult issues of heritage and identity while illuminating the world of antique prints, in her newest Maggie Summer mystery.
Updated 5.26.05
Jonathan Gash is the creator of Lovejoy, the rogueishly charming antiques dealer who antiques antic capers have been educating and entertaining readers since the late 1970's - here is the series, listed in order of publication. Several more recent titles are highlighted below the list.
Something to Kill For
Author: Holtzer, Susan
Publisher: St Martins $ 19.95 ISBN: 0312111177 Date: 0994
Winner of the fourth annual Best First Malice Domestic Novel Contest.
A murder
in the antiques community of Ann Arbor, Michigan, puts Anneke Haagen on the
trail of a killer. Had the victim been killed for some priceless item she found
at a garage sale? As the murders continue, Anneke gets closer to the Big Score.
Updated 5.26.05
Overbooked is a volunteer project undertaken by Ann Chambers Theis: Collection Management Administrator, Chesterfield County (VA) Public Library. 9501 Lori Rd. or P.O. Box 297, Chesterfield, VA, 23832. Phone: 804.748.1760.
Overbooked is not an official Chesterfield County Public Library service. Overbooked.org is a nonprofit web site hosted by CVCO - Central Virginia's Community Online. Overbooked.com is a nonprofit website in experimental mode. Overbooked does not endorse any commercial providers (or their products and services) linked to from this web site.
Join the Overbooked List - A quiet list for readers to share recent reads, keep up to date with details about new books, discuss favorite authors/titles, etc.
Comments, suggestions, corrections: Ann Chambers Theis (AKA Ann/ACT): Ann (ann_overbooked@earthlink.net) or Ann (ann@overbooked.com)
I really appreciate all the e-mail I receive from avid readers and writers and regret that I am not able to respond to all correspondents.
