House-flipper Whitney Whitaker and her cousin Buck are on to their next renovating project. They found an abandoned church building outside of Nashville and made an offer. The members of the church had moved to a bigger, more modern building and left this one, waiting for 9 years until someone found an interest in it. Whitney and Buck got a good price on it, and they’re ready to get started cleaning it out and deciding what they want to do with it.
They have barely shown up and gotten started, haven’t even let Whitney’s cat Sawdust out of his carrier yet, when they realize that there are horses on the property. Whitney even finds one in the church building. and she’s trying to figure out how to get it out without the horse hurting her or getting too scared. But before she can figure out how, two men show up, one with a big knife in his belt and an electronic cattle prod in his hands.
The man with the cattle prod introduces himself as Nolan and tells them to get off his property. When Whitney explains that they closed on the property that morning, he says that he had put in the paperwork for an adverse possession eight years ago, and since he had been using the property for eight years, it was now rightfully his. Whitney stands by her paperwork, saying that if he had a legal claim to the land, then it would have come up during the title search, so clearly there was no official record of him being the owner.
They both threaten to call the police, but first Nolan and his ranch hand gather their horses and move them back to the farm. Meanwhile, Whitney calls the Nashville police. The property they bought is unusual because most of it is in Davidson county, which is also where Nashville is, but there is a corner of the property that is in Sumner county, which is where Nolan’s ranch is. He calls the county sheriff, and eventually they all meet up again at the church. The two officers confer and tell them that what they have is a civil issue, but they side with Whitney and her paperwork. Whitney calls her attorney, and he begins the search to find out what’s happened.
Nolan leaves after the officers do, but he’s clearly not happy about the situation. Whitney and Buck don’t care, as long as he goes back to his ranch and leaves them alone. As they start to look around the property and think about what they’d like to do with it, they make their way up to the belfry, where there is still a working bell. Sawdust loves the rope and decides to sharpen his claws by grabbing at it. And Whitney gets an idea.
The space is special, and while lots of people are looking to live in a place that has a storied history, she thinks that turning the church into a residence would be a miss. With all the performers in Nashville, there is always a need for more music venues, so she decides they should renovate the church into a small venue, where they can host musicians or dancers or even plays. Then they realize that the parsonage nearby could be a small bistro where customers could eat dinner before the shows.
As the ideas start to pop, Whitney looks at the beautiful stained glass windows that have made it through the years and decides she wants to replace the other stained glass windows with more colorful windows. She finds a nearby artist who can create the windows for her and orders two that are completely custom and two that are ready-made. She loves supporting local artists, but she also has to keep an eye on the budget, and that seems a fair compromise to her. The artist, Lauren, agrees to deliver the new windows in a month, and Whitney gets back to work on everything else that needs to be renovated on the church.
The weeks go by, and the new venue, the Joyful Noise Playhouse, starts to come together. It’s almost the day for their hearing about the property’s ownership, and it’s the delivery day for the new windows. Lauren had hired a delivery company to bring the windows out to Whitney. The delivery driver brings the boxes in to the church, but Whitney and Buck decide to store them in the bedroom of the parsonage until they can get them installed. But while they’re over there, they think they hear the church’s bell ringing. hey run back to the belfry and find the delivery man laying there, unmoving, with rope burns on his neck.
They immediately call an ambulance and the police, and Whitney’s boyfriend, homicide detective Collin Flynn gets called out there too. But who would want to murder the man? Was it a robbery? Could it have been a drug deal gone bad? Did he see something that he shouldn’t have? Or is there some other reason for the man’s death? Whitney is determined to figure it out so she can move forward with her plans for the music venue. But will that determination put her in the crosshairs of a killer?
Batten Down the Belfry is the fourth in Diane Kelly’s House-Flipper Mysteries. The characters of Whitney and Buck, Whitney’s friend and roommate (and Buck’s girlfriend) Colette, detective Collin, and that scene-stealing cat Sawdust are back to fight crime and modernize old buildings. Bringing their hard work and ingenuity to this abandoned church as well as to the crime that happened there.
I enjoyed Batten Down the Belfry. These characters are very likable, and the writing is smooth as silk. Most of the chapters are told from Whitney’s point of view, but every once in a while, you get a different perspective, namely that of Sawdust. The cat gets to tell pieces of his own story, which is a little unusual but definitely fun. This is the first book in this series that I’ve read, so I can say that you do not need to read the previous books to find out what’s going on. Although once you spend some time with these characters, in their Nashville, then you may find that you want to go back to the beginning and read them all.
Egalleys for Batten Down the Belfry were provided by St. Martin’s Press through NetGalley, with many thanks.
