"Grim Pickings" is a mystery written in the footsteps (maybe keystrokes is more appropriate here!) of Agatha Christie. The author drops a cast of interesting characters into a claustrophobic setting. An uninvited, unwelcome person forces himself into the group and a murder results. Before the unprepossessing amateur sleuth and the police can sort through the myriad of motives, there is another murder attempt and an arson/murder. Two or three times the reader figures out "who done it" -- only to be shortly thrown for a loop with new developments. Believeable characters, fresh setting (an Australian apple orchard), good story! This fat plot plays out over 386 pages.
cozy mystery.
