Tiffany: A Cozy Murder Mystery

by Rob Kelley

Harry Kavanagh, a wealthy mutual funds manager, is found bludgeoned to death with a fire place poker in his living room. His beautiful, pampered, trophy wife, Tiffany, is discovered walking in a daze down by the old Moxley Covered Bridge with no recollection of the event. When the deputies search her white Mercedes sports car, they find the bloody murder weapon in the trunk. Sheriff Grady is certain he has a slam-dunk case, and charges her with first-degree murder. When a local doctor, with a yearning for helping people in trouble, finds traces of an amnesia-causing drug in the suspect's system, she becomes convinced that Tiffany is being railroaded. She organizes a dream team of people with different skills to solve the mystery. If you like small town, low budget sleuthing with a cereal bowl of colorful characters, you'll enjoy Tiffany.

217 pages, Kindle Edition

Published December 26, 2017

About the author

Rob Kelley is a Canadian author of both fiction and non-fiction books. He grew up in a small northern gold mining town called Timmins, Ontario. He worked six summers underground in one of the area's gold mines in his teens and early twenties to earn money for university. "I always loved school. So much fun stuff to get involved in. My first memorable writing experience was in grade four. On Friday afternoons, our teacher, Miss Anderson, would allow us to present one-act plays for the class's entertainment, if we each donated ten cents to the Red Cross jar. So on Thursday nights, my buddy, Jack Watson and I would lie on his bedroom floor, along with the cat, and scribble up four or five pages of storyline and dialogue to present to the class the next day. It was great fun."

Rob spent his working career in Hamilton, Ontario where he worked as a teacher, business department head, computer education consultant and textbook author. He loves writing romance suspense, international suspense thrillers, cosy small town mysteries and self-help books. Favorite authors: John Grisham, James Patterson (with Maxine Paetro), David Baldacci, Janet Evanovich and Agatha Christie.

Reviews

[Francine · Rating 4 out of 5]

Let me start by saying don’t judge this book by its cover or its title. Although the young lady on the cover is attractive, when I first was looking for something to read, at first glance I passed this book over because it looked like some vapid romance novel which is not what I was looking for at all. The book is actually a small town cozy mystery, my favourite type of mystery, but you wouldn’t know that with just a quick look. Those things aside, it’s quite a good little whodunit. The body appears right at the start which is how I like it. No long introductions or lengthy character development before the murder, just two mischievous boys and their remote control car providing a unique way to discover a body. The character development comes throughout the book and, although it’s not particularly in-depth, it’s still quite well done.
A man is dead and his wife is missing and when she is found she doesn’t remember anything. The sheriff isn’t particularly likeable and may even be a bit crooked. Tiffany’s lawyer, Jack, is a young man who may be in over his head and has to work with a retired sheriff who doesn’t seem to have much faith in young Jack. There’s a plethora of suspects and every time I thought I had it all figured out, somebody else would enter the pool of maybe murderers.
I absolutely loved the setting that Mr. Kelley created in this book and, having lived in a small town most of my life, it was easy to see similarities in how things are done. The characters are well written and the style of writing is nice and easy. This is the type of book I would take on vacation to enjoy, no deep thinking required, just a fun mystery to solve. The one thing in the book I would add is a bit more about life in the town and the personal lives of characters. It would add a bit more atmosphere to the book. It’s not a big problem in the book but it would be nice to see how the characters interact in their everyday lives a bit more. Otherwise, this is a fun and enjoyable book that is worth picking up to read.

[Julie Baswell · Rating 4 out of 5]

When Harry Kavanagh is found murdered at his home in the new posh subdivision of Maple Grove, his wife Tiffany can’t be found and becomes the number one suspect. When she is later found wandering aimlessly near the river, Tiffany has no memory of what happened. With it being an election year, Sheriff Grady is uninterested in proving Tiffany innocent. So it’s up to Jack Cole, her lawyer, working with Private Investigator Atticus Penfield, who is the former sheriff, and Dr. Joyce Lees, a mental health physician, to uncover the true killer.

This was a great murder mystery. The suspects kept stacking up, but things kept leading back to the first suspect. I love it when that happens. You don’t know who to believe and who to suspect. The cast of characters were likeable, and the plot was convincing. It was refreshing to have an upstanding judge and court. That was unexpected, especially after seeing the Sheriff so politically ambitious. Even the rest of the police department was upstanding, making me like this read so much more. I like the author’s writing style of keeping the story sincere and honest, and I hope this cast of characters find their way into another story.

[Amanda · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tiffany by Robert Kelley is a mystery novel set in a small town where the Chelsea Murder Mystery Club is founded to prove a women who appears to have short term memory loss is indicted for the murder of her husband. There are a lot of red herrings in this fun cozy mystery encountered by the two leads of the CMMC, Atticus who is the retired Sherriff (who was actually fired) from area and a top of the class Harvard lawyer turned Matlock who both even end up in their own courtroom litigation before the conclusion of this novel. The end is unexpected and you’ll be flipping pages until you get there!
The most fantastic part of this book is the characters. The psychiatrist who puts the Chelsea Murder Mystery Club into existence is a strong, determined, and smart character but possibly a little eccentric. While she doesn’t show up much in the actual footwork of putting the case together I loved her personality and the relationship between Joyce and Jack made me love her more. Jack and Atticus make a hilarious team and really run into some rather comedic situations. I could easily see them starring in their own television show. They were simply perfect together. I also really admired Wendell for the work he did as we saw the new Sherriff who half heartedly took the easiest course despite the need to consider any of his choices and frequently denied the rights of his prisoners. He was a great foil as an upstanding police officer. I’d love to read more adventures from the Chelsea Murder Mystery Club.
The plot is also another home run for this mystery. The opening scene of the book for me was perfect! Two kids with a rigged toy car find a dead body while trying to scare a cat send the police flying to the scene. It was interesting in the approach and instantly had my attention. The subplots are numerous, although as I’ll address in a moment they may have been a little too adventurous, but include two love interests that kindle through the book, the litigation of half the Murder Mystery Club, and numerous suspects that link together through the most uncommon of ways. Atticus is right in saying the heart of the story was finding out how each person’s part fit into the entire picture.
The plot was great and there were plenty of red herrings and twists that left me wondering where on earth this was all going to end up at. My only disappointment was with how the red herrings were handled in that they never really quite ended up resolved for me. There were certainly a lot of characters holding on to illegal drugs by the end of the book and while each crime individually made sense to me the commonality between them all and the fact that there were so many doing the exact same crime in the small town left me with a raised eyebrow. There’s certainly a drug epidemic among our nation now so a little further writing to wrap together the red herrings would have easily tied everything together nicely. That’s my only complaint. The writing style and editing are also professional and well done.
Overall this was a brilliant mystery that kept me guessing until the end. The only other complaint I would have is Atticus is named after a book, not a movie!