Overview
Now best known for her New York Times-bestselling Sookie Stackhouse novels, Charlaine Harris garnered an unusual degree of acclaim with her first novel -- the story of a murder that embroils a small-town reporter in a mystery that hits close to home.Catherine Linton came home to Lowfield, Mississippi convinced that the untimely deaths of her parents in a car accident was no accident -- but nobody believed her. So she stayed, taking a job at the local paper, to try to both convince the sheriff that she was right-and maybe convince herself she was wrong. After all, her father had been the town doctor, loved (she always thought) by all. To think he was killed was to think that one of her friends or neighbors has harbored some deep resentment toward him. Then she finds the dead body of the women who had been her father's nurse for many years. Obviously murdered. Now Catherine knows that she was not wrong about her parent's death. Someone in Lowfield has a terrible secret, a secret worth killing for. Not once, not twice, but -- when another body is found -- three times. And the killer won't hesitate to add more victims to the list, as Catherine gets closer and closer to the truth.
Synopsis
An engrossing Southern mystery from the NY Times best-selling author of the Sookie Stackhouse series - Six months after the death of her parents in a car crash, Catherine Linton returns to her hometown of Lowfield, Mississippi, unconvinced that it was an accident and looking for answers. Her suspicions seem to be confirmed when she stumbles upon the dead and beaten body of her doctor father’s long-time nurse. Catherine is right: there are secrets being kept in Lowfield. But if she continues to investigate, the town where she grew up may be the same place where she is sent to her grave . . .
Editorials
From Barnes & Noble
The Barnes & Noble ReviewOut of print for more than 20 years, the debut novel from prolific mystery author Charlaine Harris (the Aurora Teagarden saga, the Lily Bard stories, et al.) is finally available once again. But unlike her lighthearted and humor-filled Sookie Stackhouse series, Sweet and Deadly is an eerie and atmospheric gem about a young woman named Catherine Linton, who returns to her home in Lowfield, Mississippi, following her parents' tragic death and becomes entangled in the small town's dirty little secrets.
While out target shooting on her family's land, the still-grieving Catherine stumbles across the corpse of a brutally beaten woman hidden away in an old shack. The victim, it turns out, was a decidedly unlikable nurse who worked with Catherine's physician father. Catherine investigates further and soon uncovers the scandalous truth: The nurse was blackmailing someone in the town -- someone prominent and someone desperate enough to kill in order to keep a secret…
Longtime Harris fans will be more than pleasantly surprised by this dark and disturbing murder mystery set in a small town on the Mississippi Delta. Vividly re-creating the unique and sometimes negative aspects of southern culture (replete with underpinnings of racism, sexism, self-righteousness, etc.), Sweet and Deadly is archetypical southern gothic -- especially the novel's shocking conclusion. Highly recommended. Paul Goat Allen