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Book Summary and Reviews of The Alpine Recluse by Mary Daheim

The Alpine Recluse by Mary Daheim

The Alpine Recluse

An Emma Lord Mystery

by Mary Daheim

  • Critics' Consensus (1):
  • Published:
  • Mar 2006, 336 pages
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About this book

Book Summary

In the middle of a hot midsummer night, Emma is awakened by fire trucks rushing to a blaze at the nearby home of newlyweds Tim and Tiffany Rafferty. At daybreak, Tiffany and her unborn child are safe, but Tim, never blessed with good luck in all his thirty-plus years, has perished in the fierce conflagration. Sheriff Milo Dodge suspects murder and arson, and rumors fly from the Burger Barn and Mugs Ahoy to the Grocery Basket and the Venison Inn. Some swear the Rafferty marriage was crumbling. Others hint at stock fraud. A few mention momentary sightings of a possibly mad recluse known as Old Nick.

Sacrificing the heady enticements of a budding romance to nail down a great story, Emma shifts into high investigative gear while her fearless House & Home editor, Vida Runkel, rushes in where angels fear to tread: straight into the private lives of some of Alpine’s most respectable–and now terminally edgy–citizens. But neither Emma nor Vida suspects the unbelievable truth.

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Reviews

Media Reviews

"The ending is a bit of a cheat, but if you prefer your mysteries small, insular and chatty, Daheim is your gal." - Kirkus Reviews.

"Well-drawn characters and a complex crime are a winning combination in Daheim's 18th Emma Lord mystery." - Publishers Weekly.

This information about The Alpine Recluse was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.

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Author Information

Mary Daheim Author Biography

Seattle native Mary Richardson Daheim lives three miles from the house where she was raised. From her dining nook she can see the maple tree in front of her childhood home. Mary isn't one for change when it comes to geography. Upon getting her journalism degree from the University of Washington (she can see the campus from the dining nook, too), she went to work for a newspaper in Anacortes WA. Then, after her marriage to David Daheim, his first college teaching post was in Port Angeles where she became a reporter for the local daily. Both tours of small-town duty gave her the background for the Alpine/Emma Lord series.

Mary spent much of her non-fiction career in public relations (some would say PR is fiction, too). But ever since she learned how to read and write, Mary wanted to...

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