Kilned at the Ceramic Shop

Braddock Mystery, #1

by

Donna Clancy

Entertaining and interesting beginning to a new cozy mystery series.

Kilned at the Ceramic Shop is the first book in author Donna Clancy's new cozy Braddock Mystery series set in the small town of Braddock, Maine. Although I felt the story gets off to an uneven start, the action quickly picks up, and the plot thickens, as they say. 

The main character is successful mystery author Tammy Wright, who returns to her hometown of Braddock after a seven-year absence to assist her Aunt Clara at her ceramics shop during the upcoming tourist season. Besides getting up in years, Clara Beale suffers more and more from arthritis, making the tasks at her beloved business difficult and painful. Tammy plans to split her time between working at the shop and writing her next mystery. Their initial reunion at the shop was a little confusing to me as they didn't seem particularly close, and her arrival didn't appear well planned. Her aunt has prepared the guest cottage for her, which is behind her own home, but it still feels like she has just "shown up," not having seen her aunt once since high school. 

Another inconsistency for me occurs during and after the women's confrontation with Wilmot Sawyer. Clara comes across as a doddering, indecisive old woman, and it takes a lot of coaching from Tammy for her to build up to righteous anger over Wilmot's actions. However, she is consistently described as a very strong woman throughout the rest of the book. She is nice, caring, and active in her town's leadership, but seems easily swayed by others. 

As the first in a series, the author must craft an entire town and its population on which to build her stories, and it is perhaps even more critical in this case, as the series title bears the town's name. The author introduces the various businesses, neighbors, and townspeople of Braddock without overwhelming the reader with blocks and blocks of exposition. People and places are featured as natural and fun parts of the story. I thought it was unusual in this typical cozy mystery town that the residents seemed to show only a cursory concern over the murder and kidnapping of two of their lifelong friends and neighbors, though. Clara is an elected selectman, and there's no massive gathering of searchers or candlelight vigil. However, later, the entire town comes together to help Tammy clean up the destruction at the ceramic shop, so if Clara is ever found, she doesn't encounter a mess when she returns to work. There was the same lack of reaction after the murder: no funeral was mentioned or well-attended visitation. 

Still, the story picks up and gains a lot of momentum as Tammy takes matters into her own hands to find out who is behind her aunt's disappearance, the acts of vandalism and destruction, and the murder. The attraction between Tammy and Zeke is sweet and believable, slowly building into something more. I loved this second chance at a relationship together for both of them. 

The two real estate developers are both pieces of work and easy to boo and hiss. There is a plentiful sprinkling of clues for the alert reader to note, and I thought the resolution was clever and satisfyingly complex once all was finally revealed. 

I recommend KILNED AT THE CERAMIC SHOP for cozy mystery readers, especially those with an interest in the hobby of making ceramics.

 I voluntarily reviewed this after receiving an Advance Review Copy from the author through Great Escapes Virtual Book Tours.