The Devil's Cold Dish
A Mystery
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3.0 • 1 Rating
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- $12.99
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
Will Rees is back home on his farm in 1796 Maine with his teenage son, his pregnant wife, their five adopted children, and endless farm work under the blistering summer sun. But for all that, Rees is happy to have returned to Dugard, Maine, the town where he was born and raised, and where he's always felt at home.
Until now.
When a man is found dead - murdered - after getting into a public dispute with Rees, Rees starts to realize someone is intentionally trying to pin the murder on him. Then, his farm is attacked, his wife is accused of witchcraft, and a second body is found that points to the Rees family.
Rees can feel the town of Dugard turning against him, and he knows that he and his family won't be safe there unless he can find the murderer and reveal the truth...before the murderer gets to him first.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Set in the summer of 1796, Kuhns's uneven fifth mystery (after 2015's Death in Salem) finds weaver Will Rees and his pregnant wife, Lydia, back at their farm in rural Dugard, Maine. Shortly after Will and fellow Dugard resident Zadoc Ward come to blows over political differences, Zadoc is found shot to death. As a suspect, Will is not permitted to help Dugard's constable investigate, but he has plenty to do. The townspeople are inflamed by rumors that Lydia, raised in the little-understood Shaker sect, is a witch, and some attack her at the local market and sabotage the couple's livestock. When a second murder with ritual elements seems to implicate her, they clamor for her arrest. Will ends up fleeing the farm after first sending Lydia and their younger children away to safety. Though overcomplicated backstory and plotting sometimes blunt the story's drama, Kuhns gives it timely resonance with a thoughtful exploration of the way fears around religious difference can trigger suspicion, hatred, and even violence.
