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SNIPPED IN THE BUD
by Kate Collins
Signet, May 2006
304 pages
$6.99
ISBN: 0451218310


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

Abby Knight, who failed out of law school, largely, she believes, because of the tyrannical professor, Z Archibald Puffer, has vowed never to return to the campus. However, curiosity gets the better of her when her florist shop, Bloomers, receives an order from him for a black rose.

She decides to deliver the rose personally, to confront the dragon in his lair. When she arrives, he loses his temper, denies having ordered the flower, and throws it into the waste basket. Infuriated, Abby leaves, but she soon decides to return and retrieve the flower and its vase. What she finds in Potter's office is not the professor, but the corpse of Professor Carson Reed, who had recently seen to Abby's being arrested at an animal rights demonstration.

Abby is 'outed' as having been at the crime scene by ambitious reporter Connor Mackay, who can't quite understand her being so upset because he was just doing his job. And further, he can't understand why she resists his romantic advances. Thanks to his article and witnesses to her altercation with Reed, she has become a suspect and is forced to temporarily leave her beloved flower shop and take on a series of disguises concocted by one of the book's really loathsome characters, her cousin Jillian, who has landed in Abby's apartment after the break-up of her fourth engagement.

Collins has a gift for creating vivid characters, who, fortunately never move into the realm of caricature. Abby becomes a combination of Nancy Drew and Mata Hari. Her cousin Jillian is so lifelike that one can barely refrain from screaming at her, and Marco, Abby's boyfriend, a former cop turned restaurant owner is the rock on whom she can always rely.

The plot is well paced, with Abby trying to balance her attempt to clear her name with her need to keep a very low profile. She ultimately uncovers a petnapping scheme. And as Abby tries to prove that the despised Potter is the killer, others are trying to prove that she is -- a merry chase for all.

Reviewed by Mary Elizabeth Devine, August 2006

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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