Three-Day TownMargaret Maron |
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 12/26/2011 |
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Although they've been married over a year, Dwight Bryant and Deborah Knott are finally going on a honeymoon. They leave North Carolina for New York City in January. A relative of Deborah's has an apartment there they can live in for a week. They'll take the train rather than fly. All is set for a week on the town. An old family friend asks them to deliver a package to her granddaughter. Ann Harald. After arriving in New York City, Deborah tries to contact Ann. Ann is out of town, but her daughter Sigrid can take it. Sigrid is a lieutenant with the New York Police and is wealthy through an inheritance from a famous artist. She is also a bit awkward, but has purposefully worked on improving her presentation of herself so she dresses and holds better than she had before she had met the man. Sigrid can't come then and asks them to open it. It is a startling, vulgar statue. Deborah and Dwight are invited to a tropics party down the hall in the apartment building. Sigrid shows up then to get the statue. When Deborah takes her back to the apartment to get it, it's missing. As they look through the apartment, they find the body of the building manager and maintenance guy. Now Sigrid has to move from the role of distant cousin to homicide detective. Presumably the building is secure. No one goes up from the lobby without being in the elevator which is run by one of the men who operate it 24/7. But there was a party that night with a lot of people coming and going. The party was on the same floor as Deborah and Dwight's apartment. It's going to take a while to figure out who was there and question everyone who attended the party. All the tenants think the manager is great. Who would want to kill him? Did he catch someone trying to steal the statue? Who knew the statue was even there? Margaret Maron has combined the characters from her two mystery series. We haven't heard from Sigrid Harald since right after Oscar Naumann died and left her wealthy. When she was mentioned at the end of Christmas Mourning, it was obvious she would be in the next Deborah Knott book. Three-Day Town has some interesting twists and turns. The statue is a piece of work showing obviously Jewish people in lewd sexual positions. This was a strange piece of anti-Semitic sculpting done before World War II and the sculptor was racist with Aryan leanings. The piece is not erotica but more of a degradation. Until I read this book I never imagined such work could exist. But now I have to wonder. Just because I haven't thought of it doesn't mean someone else hasn't. Did Maron base that piece on a real item? The manager had some deep secrets of his own. His wife breaks down when she hears the news and has to be hospitalized. Perhaps that's why he was killed, rather than a theft. There were numerous people involved with the art world at the party. Many people used the Knott's apartment bathroom when the ones at the party were in use. Perhaps someone came in, saw and recognized the artist's work, and took it. The manager just happened in at the time. Or perhaps the disgruntled tenants from the floor above were able to get revenge on the manager. There are a number of possibilities that Sigrid and her team have to wade through in order to solve the mystery. I enjoyed Three-Day Town while I was reading it. Unfortunately, within three or four days I had to stop and think about what happened in it. It didn't stick with me (of course, I'm reading Fountainhead right now, which puts a lot of other work out of a person's head). Maron keeps the reader involved throughout, and Three-Day Town is an enjoyable escape read. Notice: Suggestive dialogue or situations (Deborah and Dwight are on their honeymoon, don't forget) |
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The Deborah Knott Series:
The Bootlegger's Daughter |
The Sigrid Harald series:
One Coffee With
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These reviews are personal opinions only and in no way reflect other readers' opinions of the books discussed.
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