For Every Season

by Frankie J. Jones

After losing her job and girlfriend in the same day, Andrea "Andi" Kane goes home to San Antonio to rest and re-evaluate her life. But her relaxation is quickly disrupted when her grandmother tells Andi that she wants her to solve a murder that occurred sixty-five years earlier. The shock of the request is nothing compared to the one Andi receives when she discovers the convicted murderer was none other than her own great-grandfather. Andi's search will take her to HiHo, a small town in South Texas. Here, she meets a host of colorful citizens to include the charming district attorney Janice Reed. As Andi struggles with rebuilding her life, she finds herself being drawn deeper into the rich and sometimes deadly mysteries of small town life.

Genres: Lesbian, Mystery, LGBT, Fiction, Romance, Lesbian Fiction

234 pages, Paperback

First published January 11, 2005

About the author

All About Frankie... I was born in a town so small, that rather than listing the population figure on the city limit sign, we simply listed the citizen's names. From there I joined the Army and spent three great years in Germany. It's a beautiful country that everyone should visit if given the opportunity. However, I wouldn't recommend joining the Army as a method of traveling there.
After leaving the Army, I moved to San Antonio, Texas. I was now living in a city so large that the population figure would barely fit on the city limit sign. I soon went to work for a giant telecommunication company and served a long sentence there. Now through a strange twist of events I find myself writing full-time.
Someone once told me that I should list my hobbies in order for my readers to get to know me better. Well, I'm one of those people who never met a hobby she didn't like. It's much easier for me simply to tell you that short of jumping out of a perfectly good plane, there's not much I dislike.
I live with an extraordinary woman, Martha Cabrera, extraordinary in the sense that she doesn't mind my wild never-ending string of hobbies. We love to spend free weekends at the coast, fishing. I harbor a dream of someday catching a fish that's actually bigger than my bait.
I began writing when I was a kid. In my stories, the girls kept dumping the boys and running away with each other. This was a curiosity for me, since at that time; I had no idea what a lesbian was. Thankfully, the Army corrected that lapse in my education. You can imagine my surprise when I learned that not only was it all right to write these stories, but a place called Naiad Press would actually pay for them.
Naiad Press published my first three novels: Rhythm Tide, Whispers in the Wind and Captive Heart. I moved over to Bella Books 2001. (from the author's website)

Frankie J. Jones has also written a number of books as Megan Carter.

Reviews

[Megan]

When I pick up a Bella book, I sometimes wonder if I shouldn’t just assign it a rating of somewhere between a 2.5 and a 3.5 and go on to something else. I’m talking about Bella originals, now, not reprints. I usually come around to the hope that I might run into something really outstanding, something that would be a credit to the genre, but the fact that none of the 24 books in my Top 20 list are Bella originals tells its own tale. Of course, reading average or bad books is as much my job as reading good ones. Where does For Every Season fit? Well, it doesn’t; it is surprisingly good.

Andi Kane is at the end of a nowhere relationship when she is laid off her job at the phone company. Tail tucked firmly between her legs, she returns to her parents’ home in San Antonio to get her head together and look for another job. But somehow her grandmother railroads her into looking into Andi’s great-grandfather’s murder conviction sixty-five years previously. This despite the fact that she has no experience in sleuthing and that three private detective agencies have already failed to exonerate him.

One of the good things about this book—and there are many—is the fact that at first, there seems no way in hell that Andi can unearth any new evidence about a crime that happened before even her mother was born. But through diligence, luck, and the help of some new friends, Andi just might manage it. And she manages it in a way that is both believable and interesting

In the meantime, Andi has become attracted to the district attorney, who also has an interest in the case. What happens between them is the sub-crux of the story—one that spans at least three generations. It is hard not to like Andi—we have all been at a crossroads in our lives, guilty over our perceived failures and anxious to travel down a new road. The small, fictional town of HiHo, Texas is a hoot, as are a lot of the people in it.

It is a well-written, well-edited, and well-investigated mystery. Bravo to Bella for breaking out of the mold of their own making. Give this one somewhere around a 4 and recommend it to your friends, as I am doing at this moment.

I read what seems to be the first printing of the Bella edition.

Note: This review is included in my book The Art of the Lesbian Mystery Novel, along with information on over 1250 other lesbian mysteries by over 400 authors.

[Dide · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is well written. Great premise, very well plotted and a good feel conclusion. Perhaps it deserves a 4.5 star rating!

[Sharon · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really, really liked this story. It was light, lovely, and had a really smooth mystery. I loved that the story was so family oriented. I loved how LGBTQIA friendly HiHo is. I loved how wonderful a couple Andi and Janice made after they got over all the obstacles in their way. This was a lovely read that was more light mystery than romance. I really enjoyed this story.