Falling to Pieces: A Quilt Shop Mystery (Shipshewana Amish Mystery)

For years all I read were cozy mysteries until I got into the Amish fiction genre. Falling to Pieces written by Vanetta Chapman beings both reading styles to me. I love that we were trying to fiqure out who did it while still getting the Amish feel too.

Falling to Pieces: A Quilt Shop Murder is the first book in Chapman's Shipshewana Amish Mystery series. The story starts out with Callie Harper comes to Shipshewana after inheriting her Aunt Daisy's Quilt shop. She plans to come and sell it. After meeting with someone about selling the store, she learns that she will make more money on the property if it is a running store. So, she decides to keep the store open and keeps her aunt's promise to help three Amish women sell there quilts. Deborah Yoder, one of the quilt makers, becomes friends with Callie and ask her to sell the quilts on e-bay to help them make more money on the quilts. Callie agrees and everything seems to be going well until the newspaper editor writes and artile saying Callie is taking advantage of the Amish by selling the quilts on e-bay. Callie tries to get the editor to listen to her when she ends up finding him dead. Callie becomes the number one suspect in the murder. The murder ends up breaking into other business in town. Deborah and Callie decide to do some detective work to prove Callie was not the murder. Will they ever find the murder or will Callie take the heat?

I really loved this story. It was so neat getting to know the characters. I really did not want to leave Shipshewana. I wanted to know so much more after reading the story, so I'm sure I will be reading the other books in this series. This is a hard book to put down and a very easy fun read.

I was able to read this book thanks to Zondervan publishing and Net Galley. I was not required to give a postive review but an honest one.        

Book Review: Blown Away By Nancy Mehl

Blown Away: A Curl Up and Dye Mystery by Nancy Mehl is the second book in her series about a hairstylist for the dead. Hilde is back and her boyfriend, Adam Sawyer is in the center stage in this book. Hilde goes to check on a grave at the cemetery and finds a dead body in a grave. Adam is accused of the murder. Hilde and her friend from the antique store, Gabe work to help prove Adam’s innocence. A lot of other things happen like a tornado, but why wouldn’t you add a tornado to a book with the name Blown Away. We also learn about Gabe’s background. Hilde has a lot of issues in the book that go back to her father leaving her family at a young age. She has to learn to trust men and especially Adam if their relationship is going to survive.


I thought this book had more to it than the first. I was hooked at trying to figure out who did it. I did have a few problems with the book. In the book, we learn that Hilde is scared of clowns. She learns it was from her stay in the hospital. Somehow though she magically puts that fear behind her and attends two clown funerals and is dating a clown. I also love inspirational books. The religious stuff in this book seemed very forced at times. There is also a lot of fluff stuff in this story to get to the heart of the story. While this stuff is sometimes cute it does get old after awhile. Finally, I really did not like the ending again. Like in the first book, Hilde says she knows who the murder is and then we go to a point in the future where they are talking about how it all went down. As a reader I felt like I missed something big and that was the big climax of finding out who the murder was in the action of the story not at a table with others when it is all done and said. Hilde is at it again in this book with her SPAM recipes. The reader is also given another recipe which I thought was kind of nice.

If you have not read the first book, Missing Mabel you will probably be okay reading this one on its own. The author does a really good job filling you in on what happened in the first book. I really enjoyed the first book though so you might want to check it out too.

Even though I had a lot of issues with this book, I still really enjoyed it, except the ending which was a letdown. I thought it was a pretty good cozy mystery. This book also says that it is part of the Hometown Mystery series. I really have not figured that out yet as there are a lot of hometown mysteries but they are not all about the same town. I’ll have to read another one on my list and see if I can figure that one out.

I would recommend this book to people who enjoy cozy mysteries. I would like to thank Barbour Books for allowing me to read this book through NetGalley. This book comes out February 1, 2011.