Buried Stuff - Jane Wheel, Bk 4 Author:Sharon Fiffer "THE WORLD'S LARGEST GARAGE SALE....MURDER INCLUDED...Antiques picker Jane Wheel is going home, back to Kankakee, Illinois. In this little town that time forgot, a farmer friend of Jane's parents has dug up some mysterious old bones and relics. Jane just has to take a look, and she's bringing her husband and son along. The whole family plans to ... more »camp out in a cornfield and have a rip-roaring good time. And the added bonus? Kankakee is about to host the biggest town garage sale, ever. Every block will be filled with the great stuff that is one man's junk, but another man's treasure-McCoy, Bakelite, vintage clothes, Depression glass, Griswold frying pans. What could possibly go wrong? A murder on the old man's farm, just for starters....and development plans for Kankakee that spell trouble. That's Trouble, with a capital T."
An avid antique collector, Jane Wheel owns a lot of stuff. In fact, she owns too much stuff, which often gets her into trouble. So finally she agrees to do the unthinkable: she holds her very first garage sale.
Thankfully the sale ends almost before it begins, interrupted by a hysterical phone call from Jane's mother, Nellie. But Jane's relief doesn't last long. Nellie is calling to tell Jane about a mysterious discovery on a neighbor's property: bone fragments, buried in his backyard. Since Jane's husband, Charlie, is a geologist, Jane volunteers to make the trip to her hometown, Kankakee, Illinois, to see if they can help her parents' neighbor, Fuzzy Neilson, sort things out.
When they arrive, Jane and Charlie are surprised to find quite a controversy brewing in town, and not just over the mysterious discovery of the bones. In addition to Fuzzy's buried treasure, people are trying to reinvent this sleepy midwestern town. There are a couple of slick real estate developers going around town talking a big game about making Kankakee into Hometown, U.S.A. Then Jane's best friend, Tim, gets in on the act, proposing that Kankakee host the World's Largest Garage Sale. But when a man turns up murdered on Fuzzy's field, the spotlight turns back to the mysterious doings on the Neilson farm.
While Charlie uncovers what may or may not be an archaeologically significant site, Jane manages to uncover the town's buried secrets. With the help of her family, Tim, and sometime partner P.I. Bruce Oh, Jane must sort rumor and gossip from the true crimes before it's too late.
With Buried Stuff, Sharon Fiffer continues to chronicle the events in the life of her charming, human, slightly obsessive main character, Jane Wheel; intriguing, suspenseful and lively, like the best of mystery writing today, reading Fiffer's latest novel is like coming across one of Jane's estate sale discoveries and finding it full of delights and surprises.« less
I really like this series. Jane Wheel is the ultimate garage sale-rummage sale-estate sale queen! She dithers about what to part with from her huge collections when the STUFF begins to overwhelm her home and her husband. Of course there is always a bit of mystery thrown in to challenge her "hunting" talents. The stories take place west of Chicago and up and down Route 55 which is so familiar to me as I recognize many of the towns, streets, and locations from living in that area for nearly 20 years. Even if you aren't from that area, you will enjoy these books if you have ever suffered as Jane does in throwing anything away.
Jabe returns home to Kankakee, Illinois, to help with a citywide garage sale organized by Tim, her friend and partner in the antiques business. But she also stumbles onto murder. More character development in this installment in the series.
Buried Stuff: Jane Wheel holds her very first garage sale in effort to get less desirable things out of her house, but it ends almost before it begins when she gets a phone call - Fuzzy Nelson has discovered bones on his property so Jane and her husband Charlie, a geologist, decide to go to Kankakee, Illinois, to see if they can solve this bones mystery. Poor Fuzzy has been descended upon by all kinds of various government officials and needs help. While in Kankakee Jane helps best friend Tim plan the world's largest garage sale, an effort intended to revitalize Kankakee. But then a man turns up murdered on Fuzzy's property and reader is taken back to the mystery there. Interesting family relationships and characters, antique lore, and the history of Kankakee are all here. Jane Wheel's a quirky character. Good read.