When Jacobia "Jake" Tiptree left behind her high-powered, high-risk career on Wall Street for the charming town of Eastport, Maine, she expected a quiet life spent fixing up her 1823 Federal-style house. But there are skeletons in her closet that may prove beyond repair...Suddenly the perils of the stock market pale in comparison to the murder, mayhem, and mystery of remodeling.
From the Hardcover edition.
From Publishers Weekly
Graves's humorous, well-constructed 10th home improvement cozy (after 2005's Nail Biter) finds Jacobia "Jake" Tiptree, former money manager to the mob, still hard at work on her 1823 Federal-style house in Eastport, Maine. But she's got more to fix than a roof caving in: her dead ex-husband, Victor, is haunting the house and her friend Jemmy is on the run from hit men, including the ruthless Walter Henderson, who's also made his home in Eastport. A local young man who had been dating Walter's daughter has gone missing, and when Jake and her friend Ellie show up at the assassin's home, they make a grisly discovery in his barn. Graves weaves in plenty of home repair tips and a correspondence between two antiquarian experts concerning a mysterious book Jake has found in her cellar for an outing sure to please series fans. (Jan.)
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From Booklist
Jacobia "Jake" Tiptree, of Eastport, Maine, has all kinds of troubles. Her roof is about to fall in, and she is short on cash. Jemmy Wechsler, who helped her when she was a runaway teenager, is back in her life, but a hit man is looking for him. Her young-adult son is an alcoholic, and the son of a friend of her housekeeper has committed suicide. Or not. Jake doesn't buy the suicide angle, and she and her friend Ellie White investigate while trying to hide Jemmy from the hit man and keep her son on the wagon. The plotlines come together in classic mystery fashion when Jake gathers all the suspects together for the finale. An interesting subplot involving an old book found in Jake's cellar is not resolved but may be explained in the next installment. Backstory on Jake's unsavory past, more context concerning her friendship with Ellie, the usual assortment of home-improvement tips, and a touch of the supernatural all add interest to this tenth entry in Graves' engaging series, which continues to be spiced by plenty of humor. Sue O'Brien
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