Quite fun readable mystery but also unexpectedly charming and disarming look at aging and relationships between genders, family members, and between generations. ( )

I think this is the only stand-alone book that the late Charlotte MacLeod wrote under her pen name of Alisa Craig. I hadn't reread it in over 20 years because the fate of one of the characters haunted me. It's not the kind of screwball comedy murder mystery the author was known for writing.

Holly Howe, the heroine, differs from Dittany Henbit, Sarah Kelling, Helen Marsh, and Janet Wadman by being tall. She has blue eyes and light brown hair, though. Like Janet, her only brother is 15 years older than herself and their parents were killed in a car accident. Unlike Janet, Holly didn't grow up in the bosom of a loving family. Roger Howe is a cold fish (Holly's words) who is as devoted to making acurate reproductions of antique furniture using 18th-century tools and techniques as his wife is devoted to him. (In Holly's opinion, Roger would make Fan cross the Grand Canyon on a rope to get a box of nails he wanted if it were on the other side.) Fan is so obsessed with seeing to it that what Roger wants, Roger gets, she doesn't remember that Holly is supposed to be recuperating from an accident and works her too hard.

Throw in the fact that the old Canadian house Roger and Holly inherited is without electricity, indoor plumbing, and running water -- well, is it any wonder that Holly is willing to be the hired girl at Cliff House, the big Victorian place a few miles out of town? Cliff House rests on Partlett's Point, overlooking a portion of the Bay of Fundy known for the force with which it comes in.

There's certainly plenty of work to be done at Cliff House and only old Annie Blodgett there to do it. Annie has lived at Cliff House since she was a child. She's spent her life caring for Cousin Edith, Aunt Maude, Uncle Jonathan, and Aunt Mathilde. Aunt Mathilde Partlett is the only one of her charges left and there's no much left of the laughing, sweet aunt who was so kind to Annie, but Annie treats her with love.

Cliff House has two trustees: Claudine Partlett and Earl Stoodley. Claudine genuinely cares about Annie and Mathidle. Earl would be perfectly happy to have both old women die -- the sooner, the better. Cliff House has been willed to Jugtown and Earl wants to turn it and its antiques into a museum.

Holly finds out that Annie is terrified of noises she hears in the night, certain that Uncle Jonathan's ghost is haunting Cliff House. Holly suspects the noises have an all-too-human cause, a convicition that grows as the days pass. She has reason to believe that someone is looting the house, but who? Are the trustees untrustworthy? The more she learns, the more she wonders whom she can trust. Even the good-looking Professer Cawne and Sam Neill could be in on the thefts.

How can a newcomer with a bum leg safeguard two old ladies and the big house they live in? Holly doesn't even have a car they could flee for their lives in if they need to. Will they need to?

I liked this book much better the second time around, even if it doesn't have the chuckles I usually expect from this author. It's a pity that DNA evidence hadn't been available a few generations ago. Some of the characters would have had better lives if it could have been used to solve one of the mysteries.

One Plus One Studio did the cover with the three-legged table floating on swirled red lines that look like waves. Yes, the red is no mistake.

If your dustjacket is missing and you're wondering if you have a book club edition, check the spine to see if it has just the publisher's name or if it has a stylized figure of someone pointing a gun to the left above the words 'Crime Club" above 'Selection'. Some of my hardcover MacLeod books published by Doubleday are first editions and some are book club editions. The BCE copies have 'Doubleday' on the spine instead of the Crime Club logo. ( )