It’s an average day at the Briar Creek Library. Library Director Lindsey Norris is taking finger sandwiches and mini tarts to her Crafternoon group, the children’s librarian is dressed as a hamburger for story time, and the current mayor is having an impromptu debate with his opponent in the upcoming election, librarian Ms. Cole.
Once the mayor leaves and the Crafternooners go out to the parking lot, to get Vote for Cole yard signs from Ms. Cole’s car, they find far more than what they expected. The signs are scattered in the parking lot, and there is something else in Ms. Cole’s trunk. When Lindsey looks to see what it is, she finds a body. A man’s body, with marks around his neck like he’d been strangled.
The women call the police, and Briar Creek Police Chief Emma comes out to find that no one recognizes the man and he has no identification on him. But despite any evidence that Ms. Cole had anything to do with the man’s death, the current mayor immediately begins to imply that she does, telling Lindsey that she should fire Ms. Cole immediately and telling everyone that Ms. Cole is not fit to be mayor.
While Lindsey refuses to fire her based on unfounded accusations, she does have to consider that the mayor is her boss, so she has to be careful about showing any bias while she’s representing the library. But in her free time, she’s free to support her friend, and to do a little sleuthing on her behalf.
When Emma’s investigation uncovers the man’s identity, everyone is shocked to find out that he is one of the owner’s of the popular Nana’s Cookies . . . and a former boyfriend of Ms. Cole. She hadn’t seen Henry Lewis since they’d been in college together. They had been passionate about environmental issues together, but when her father fell ill, Ms. Cole had moved back home to help. Henry had gone on to start a business with his best friend, and they had become very successful.
When all this information comes out, the mayor doubles down on his efforts to get Ms. Cole fired from the library and forced out of the mayoral race, but Lindsey doubles down too, to find the real killer so he has nothing to hold over Ms. Cole’s head. But finding a murderer isn’t as easy as it sounds.
Was it Henry’s business partner, who wanted to sell the company in a $300 million deal? Or was it is nephew, who was being forced to put his dreams on hold while he watches over the family property? Or could it possibly be Ms. Cole’s present boyfriend, acting in a fit of jealousy? Or was it the real estate developer who wanted to buy the Lewis family property for his upscale investments?
As Lindsey uses her research superpowers and some old-fashioned friendliness to try to figure out who killed Henry and why, she is working against the clock. While she doesn’t want to let Ms. Cole go from the library, Lindsey knows that the mayor is her boss and did have the power to fire them both, so the clock is ticking on her investigation. Will she figure out the killer in time in time to save both their jobs?
Killer Research is book number 12 in Jenn McKinlay’s Library Lovers Mystery series, and it’s my favorite one for quite some time. It’s a small story, focusing on the happenings at the library and City Hall there in Briar Creek, and it’s nice that the story is nice and tight but still with lots of red herrings and potential suspects. I listened to this one on audio, and narrator Allyson Ryan is the perfect storyteller for these Library Lovers mysteries. She gets the voice of Lindsey just right and has a way of giving each character a distinctive voice also.
I thought Killer Research was lots of fun. I like these characters a lot, and it was fun getting to see a different side of a woman who is thought to be such a dedicated old-school librarian that Lindsey thought of her as “The Lemon.” Adding more texture to these characters just made the entire series more enjoyable, and I look forward to Ms. Cole getting elected mayor and finally approving those security cameras for the library, since they so obviously need them!
A copy of the audio book for Killer Research was provided by Dreamscape Media through NetGalley, with many thanks.
