Patricia Sprinkle has done it again. MacLaren Yarbrough is a fabulous character. I have read every book in the series and each time I feel as if I am visiting an old friend. In fact, I am! The town of Hopemore and the characters that live there remind me of a small town in Georgia where I lived for three years. I am waiting with breathless anticipation for the next installment in the Yarbrough's life in Hopemore, Ga. I hope I don't have to wait too long!

The quiet town of Hopemore, Georgia is the home of local Court magistrate Judge MacLaren Yarbrough, part owner of Yarbrough's Feed, Seed and Nursery. She counts her blessings especially when it comes to her husband Joe Riddley who is recovering nicely from a head wound that almost killed him. Her next door neighbor Maynard is getting married soon and he has bought himself a BMW, one that he intends to keep no matter that Skell Macdonald is offering him a fantastic deal to buy it back.

Shortly after Maynard and his bride go on their honeymoon, Skell disappears. At the same time, Skell's father Sky, a popular civic-minded town leader is run over by his own car. While the family grieves, the honeymooners are arrested in Orlando for transporting drugs. The police chief and MacLaren feel Skell knows something about this but the magistrate doesn't believe the missing man could have killed his father. She starts her own investigation and almost gets killed by a murderer who has nothing left to lose.

WHO LEFT THAT BODY IN THE RAIN? is an amateur sleuth cozy in which all the violence takes place outside of the pages of the book. There is no blood and gore but there is plenty of thrills and excitement as the sixty-something sleuth uncovers a host of buried secrets and a surplus of suspects. Readers who are fans of Carolyn Hart and Kate Kingsbury will want to buy Patricia Sprinkle's latest and that will lead to desiring the author's previous mysteries.

Harriet Klausner

I absolutely loved this book from one of my favorite authors. Patricia is a masterful wordsmith; her illustrations truly come alive. Her characters are so very real and so very southern. I especially appreciate the fact that Mac is not a spring chicken like so many other detectives I read about And this mystery really worked.

Thanks, Patricia!!

While growing up, Nancy Drew was always my heroine. Although about my age she seemed so much more clever and independent than I. Her relationship with her friends, her car, everything about her was interesting. All in all she was a great role model for negotiating those adolescent years. And she was so good at the business of detecting. She made me a life long mystery reader!
Now that I am of an age where AARP is looking for me, I have found my new Nancy Drew in the character of MacLaren Yarbrough. She is such an interesting woman with a great zest for life. Never preachy (or almost never), she yet stands out as a shining light of mature womanhood. She bears the responsibilities which come with age so well that the word burden becomes the word challenge. She makes being a mature citizen a very proud thing indeed. And the best part for an avid mystery reader is that she really gets involved in some very interesting murders and very cleverly works out the mysteries which lie behind them. Who Invited The Dead Man? is a wonderful book - read it yourself and get copies for your mystery reading friends. They will love MacLaren Yarbrough and the mystery she solves.

Oh, yes, I should add that even the current Nancy Drew fans will enjoy the Southern comfort and charm of this book. This is a mystery which can be savored by all!

Judge MacLaren Yarbrough has her hands full running Yarbrough's Feed, Seed, and Nursery, managing her magisterial duties, keeping care of her home and taking care of her husband Joe Riddley. Joe is recovering from a head injury and has to relearn how to care for himself as well as read and write. His memory is cloudy and he is prone to violent episodes.

To show their support for Joe, two hundred people come to his birthday party and he enjoyed it as much as a kid would. Only a very few knew that in the house was the body of a dead man, shot to death by a bullet to his head. The sheriff conspired with MacLaren to keep it quiet until the guests left and they succeeded. Once the investigation got underway, MacLaren does her best to find out who the killer is and to prove to the authorities that Joe had nothing to do with it.

Patricia Sprinkles has created a complex mystery with many viable suspects who had ample reason to see the victim dead. Life in a small southern town where everyone knows their neighbor and a stranger sticks out is seen as a positive thing. The heartache of living with someone who has undergone severe brain trauma is shown in agonizing detail and readers can't help but empathize with the protagonist for caring for her man.

Harriet Klausner

At a time when there is a glut of books telling women how to squeeze more and more into each day, Patricia Sprinkle tells us how to say the "N" word--NO! I love it. As wives, mothers, employees, Christians, daughters, sisters, friends, we are constantly being given MORE to do. Ms. Sprinkle shows us the way to sift the wheat from the chaff and do the things that matter most...to ourselves as well as to others. I'm a big fan of Sprinkle's terrific mysteries, but this book will stay with me a lot longer.

Trying to be everything to everyone causes feelings of frustration, resentment, stress, and fatigue. How do you do everything you are expected to do and still have time for yourself? The answer is that sometimes you can't. That is where "Women Who Do Too Much: How To Stop Doing It All and Start Enjoying Your Life" can help provide solutions.

The book starts with an analysis of why we often do too much. The price you pay for this is a loss of your inner peace and happiness. If you want to be at peace and happy you have to stop doing so many things that you don't necessarily like to do and do more of the things that you want to do, the things that bring joy to your life. Of course, that is easy enough to say, but how do you actually go about doing it? That is the subject of the remainder of the book.

A serious subject written in a fun and insightful style it is a practical guide based on Biblical principles. A recommended read for anyone feeling the frustration of too many things to do and too little time to do them.

I bought this book because the cover had a sticker that said if I did not love it, I could return it and get my money back with no questions asked. I figured what did I have to lose? Patricia Sprinkle has since become one my favorite authors. Her Maclaren Yarbrough books are easy reads. I felt like I knew her characters personally and was already missing them as I read the last few pages. If you like Perry Mason, Ben Matlock, or Jessica Fletcher, you will love Maclaren Yarbrough.

Every new mother needs this book. It makes a wonderful gift. Patricia Sprinkle truely brings to light what must be going through a babies mind. She also compares this new relationship between and mother and her new baby and the relationship that God wants to have with us. It is truly a shame that it is no longer in print.

Hooray for Silver Dagger Press which is reissuing the Sheila Travis mysteries. In this first of the series originaly published in 1988, Travis, a recent 40ish widow, comes to Chicago and the pretigious Markham Graduate School that trains future diplomats. Sheila is well qualified for her job as assistant to the president of Markham because her husband was in the diplomatic service in Japan and she served as his excellent hostess over their married years.
At Markham she is quickly tossed into a murder investigation when the body of a young woman is found in the library stacks at the institute. Suspects include not only the staff but visiting professors and an interesting group of grad students from very different backgrounds.
Sheila vows to keep clear of the investigation but her redoubtable Aunt Mary, a VERY Southern dowager and truly
delightful person, keeps urging her to dig in, despite the fact that Mike Flannagan of the Chicago Police, with an eye for Sheila, keeps reminding her to butt out. Another murder soon occurs for which Sheila feels some responsibility and her investigative skills soon are at full force.
In the end, Sheila gathers the suspects together in a large room (a throwback to the traditional mysteries of the 30's and 40's) and comes up with the solution.
Anyone who enjoys traditional mysteries with a very likable heroine will love the Shelia Travis series. Numer two, MURDER IN THE CHARLESTON MANNER is due for reissue in January.

This was a great mystery! The criminal was not obvious, and they had possible suspects in which had nothing to do with this! I thought that the criminal would be obvious, but when I read the end I had it all figured out. It had different stories that made the criminal look obvious.

Patricia Sprinkle's Sheila Travis mysteries have given me pleasurable reading ... and rereading. I always hope for one more, expecting to spend a few hours with people I like, learning some lore of southern states I have yet to visit, chuckling at a deft touch of humor, and seeing a good mystery unfold. As a veteran of the challenges of book selection for congregational libraries, I was delighted to hear that Patricia Sprinkle had created a new mystery series heroine whose first adventure would be published by Zondervan. I've read WHEN DID WE LOSE HARRIET twice in the last few weeks, and it's all there again. MacLaren Yarbrough, at sixty-plus, in Montgomery to help bully her younger brother into the crucial heart surgery he needs, takes his shift at the teen center, and rapidly becomes involved in determining the fate of 15-year-old Harriet, missing now for six weeks. Strangely, no one else seems to care. Whether it is deep concern or innate nosiness, MacLaren precipitates events that need all her insight, pluckiness, salty wit, and tenacious faith to understand. I found the people, the humor, the sense of place, and a good mystery, as I expected. Plus, Patricia Sprinkle is superb at showing that MacLaren's faith is realistic, down-to-earth, integrally part of her character, as much as her big-sister attitude to brother Jake or her inability to let a riddle go unsolved, all revealed without fanfare throughout the story. HARRIET is a very good read for any mystery fan, and a gem for a church fiction collection. I look forward to the next title (this year hopefully).

Having read all of Patricia's mysteries, I found to my surprise, that I really liked this new character best. Perhaps that's because I can relate to her age and the time in her life. I am waiting with excitement for the next installment. Go Patty!

This was a very good book--a different writing style from the ones I normally read--but very good!!

This tale of Carley and her year with her aunt and uncle and cousin is so well written! I kept having to stop to read bits of it to others around me just to share the way Patricia puts her words together. The story put me right there in that little community the whole way through. I could not put the book down.

While I did not grow up in North Carolina, this story struck a real chord with me. I found myself flooded with memories of my own childhood from a time when I stayed often with my grandparents in their old house in Florida.

I enjoyed "The Remember Box" so much that I have shared it as a Christmas gift with several of my friends.

Thank you, Patricia, for another great read!

I loved this book. It is well written and reminds me of "To Kill a Mockingbird" both in quality and style. This was a book that I did not want to finish and I fell in love with the characters. The descriptions of life in a small town in the late 1940's resonated with me and her characterizations of people were dead on. There was enough mystery to satisfy my love of that genre but it was so evocative in it's painting of "the south" and it's struggle with the racial issues that I was hooked from the beginning. Because I live in Canada, it was a treat to bury myself in this totally different world. I could almost smell the magnolia's and feel the heat.
I especially enjoyed her ability to get into the mind of an 11 year old and to see the world through her eyes. Rang true all the way through the book. Ms Sprinkle has written a winner and I look forward to reading more of her books.

I really enjoyed this sequal to The Remember Box. I found the book an interesting and easy read. Sprinkle's characters are believeable and engaging. I enjoyed her depiction of Carley's gradual move into the challenges and feelings of adolescence.

I also enjoyed learning about N. Carolina attitudes and culture of the 1950's, and the characters' perspectives on the Korean War and the Cold War. Having grown up during a similar time in a different part of the world, I found it interesting to read Sprinkle's description of air raid drills and the realistic fears of an adolescent, in light of the views and events she heard from others or from the media.

Like another reviewer, this book reminded me of The Mitford Series, although I must say that I enjoyed Sprinkle's books much more.

This is the sequel to The Remember Box and was very good. As I said about The Remember Box, it is a different writing style than most I have read, but very good. It reminded me somewhat of The Mitford Series by Jan Karon, which I loved!

What a wonderful story. I loved Carley and her delightful cousin Abby who didn't have any predjuice but only saw good in everyone. Cantankerous Mrs. Cameron was really a good person and I cried when she died. Wonderful characters, great story, a great read. Mary

Sheila Travis is an amateur detective who has to rank as one of the most reluctant sleuths in fictional history. Already well-known in Peachtree Corners near Atlanta because of her exploits in a previous case, Sheila gets involved in another caper in Snellville. Sheila is not a strong protagonist. She is just one of the crowd spending a lot of time talking with suspects and witnesses. Sheila is Miss Marple without the same energy and sparkle. The plot is difficult to follow. The dialogue is often boring and trivial but the ending proves to be a mild surprise.