Stolen Honey

Ruth Willmarth #4

by Nancy Means Wright

Stolen Honey by Nancy Means Wright released on Mar 25, 2003 is available now for purchase.

Genres: Mystery

272 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published April 9, 2002

About the author

I'm the author of 18 books of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, including 5 mystery novels from St. Martin's Press, 2 historical novels: Midnight Fires: a Mystery with Mary Wollstonecraft ('10)and the Nightmare ('11)from Perseverance Press.For those who don't know her, Wollstonecraft is the brilliant but rebellious and conflicted 18th century author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman,and mother of Mary Shelley (think Frankenstein).
I've also published 2 mysteries for kids. The Pea Soup Poisonings, based on my own 4 kids'childhood shenanigans, won the '06 Agatha Award for Best Children's/YA Novel,and The Great Circus Train Robbery was a finalist. My latest mystery is Broken Strings, a spin-off from my St. Martin's Press novels with a puppeteer sleuth, and a novel, Walking up into the Wild for "tweens" (ages 10-14, set in 18th-century Vermont just before the end of the American Revolution. It's both suspenseful and romantic and based on family history. Not a mystery.
I've published poems and short fiction for Redbook, Seventeen, American Literary Review,Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, and many literary journals and anthologies (Beacon Press, Ashland Poetry Press, Univ of Illinois Press, et al.).
A longtime actress & director,I'm a former Bread Loaf Scholar and Scholar for the Vermont Humanities Council. I live with my spouse and 2 Maine Coon cats in bucolic Middlebury, Vermont. "Becoming Mary Wollstonecraft" Facebook page.

Reviews

[Doris · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book had a very large cast of characters which didn't all work together. They were friends/neighbors, with conflicting interests and objectives, just like a true group of people would have.

However, without the tagline on the cover, I would not have known who the detective was supposed to be, since all the characters were rushing around, trying to find out pieces of the story, and very few of them were sharing with each other. This led to a confusion and some parts of the mystery that remained unsolved.

Overall though it was a very good story, with a believable finish. The part that I found most intriguing was the research in the eugenics experiments, which many people feel were unique to Hitler. They were not, as this book's research shows.

(For those who want more, read on Eugenics in the United States - not a pretty subject.)

[Cathy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was pleasantly surprised by the complexity and intertwined relationships between the characters in this book.
Set in Vermont in the fictional college town of Branbury, a thinly veiled poke at Middlebury. The students who are from local farm families have an uncomfortable relationship with the wealthy students who look down on them.
The native component of the book was honest and true to my experience as a Vermonter.
The mystery is woven in the story and each character holds a piece of the truth that is unfolded from the first to the last page.

[Claire · Rating 1 out of 5]

A little light reading to break up some career-minded selections. So far, it has all the promise such a book promises. And the bee references are accurate.

Boo-hiss. That about sums this one up. Not worth my worst enemy's brief time on this earth. To top it all off, absolutely no honey ever gets stolen. And, no, it's not a metaphor for something else, too vapid even for that. Barf.

[Victoria · Rating 2 out of 5]

I shouldn't bother complaining about errors; these books aren't great literature, just enjoyable reads. However, since this one contained a misused name when that turned out to one of the pivotal plot points...well, really. I've got a right to complain.

[Margaret]

Not a bad book but it started out with some very choppy character development which left me wondering who the "sleuth" would be until about halfway through the book. There are several subplots which got pretty well wrapped up by the end - the book got better the farther you read, so I did enjoy it.

[Magda · Rating 3 out of 5]

Enjoyable, but strange.

[Cindy · Rating 2 out of 5]

An easy read whose characters were only two dimensional and whose ending was quite sloppy. The author didn't seem to do a lot of planning ahead.

[Melissa]

This is my "blind date" book from the library - can't wait to start!