The Necessary Murder of Nonie Blake: A Samuel Craddock Mystery by Terry Shames

When she was fourteen, Nonie tried to hang her younger sister.  They sent her away to a mental institution and tried to forget they'd had her.  It was an unpleasant surprise to find her on their door stoop waiting to come in.  The mother knew she was coming but didn't share it with anyone else.  Why not?

Seventh Street Books and Edelweiss gave me the opportunity to read this book for review (thank you).  It will be published January 12th.  This is the fifth book in this series, so you can check out the others while you wait.

Nonie is only home about a week when she's killed.  The local sheriff is hoping the state police will take on the case but he has no such luck.  He's not being paid, he's retired, and now he has a murder mystery to solve.  He's sure someone in the family must have done it.  After all, the father has dementia, none of them work, and they are all a bit odd.  Maybe someone was fearful of her.  Maybe someone lost their temper.  Who knows how she ended up in the pond?

My favorite part of the story is the addition of a new trainee on the team.  She's a Hispanic.  The boys are all good ole boys who don't clean or file well and they panic at the thought of a woman in their inner sanctum.  Samuel just gives her some pieces of the investigation and hopes she might find something he didn't.  She does.  And that sends him down another path of sleuthing.

This was a good mystery.  Everyone is lying in some way.  There's a family secret at the base of this problem.  It's not one most of us would have.  It has a nice twist to it.  I'll remember this story for a while.