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Josh Handleman and his father Abe weren't close. So Josh has quite a few surprises in store for him when he comes back to his father's house to settle the estate. Abe fell down a flight of stairs; not the best way to go but there are worse. As Josh handles the details, large and small, surrounding his father's death, he learns more about his father than he expected. First of all, his very frugal father was a wealthy man, a man who tried to do as much good with his money as possible. Abe was a public and private philanthropist. Then there is the matter of his diamond collection, which is nowhere to be found. Did his houseguest and alleged cousin Kassian steal the stones? Or was it someone else, one of Josh's friends from his past? Or perhaps it was Carol, the woman Abe was engaged to - another part of Abe's life that Josh knew nothing about. Josh doesn't come to Virginia in a vacuum. His wife has left him, his partner has severed the connection, and Josh is at loose ends. Throw into this mix an old Russian Jew named Lev, one of Abe's friends, the father of one of Josh's friends. Lev is convinced that Abe was murdered, and he's picked Kassian for the killer. DIAMONDS FOR THE DEAD is a good mystery. The characters are people the reader can care about. The plot is believable. The setting is handled well, particularly the scenes involving Josh and a snow storm. The pace is slower than one might expect, although this is not necessarily a drawback. This is a story about characters, so the level of suspense doesn't need to be ratcheted up, the tension doesn't have to be intense. DIAMONDS FOR THE DEAD is a little gem. § P.J. Coldren lives in northern lower Michigan where she reads and reviews widely across the mystery genre when she isn't working in her local hospital pharmacy.
Reviewed by P.J. Coldren, August 2010
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