Nero Blanc, A Crossworder’s Delight

A Crossworder's Delight

Nero Blanc

Berkley, Oct. 2005, $10.95, 176 pp.

ISBN 0425206564

It is the day after Thanksgiving and most everyone in New Castle, Massachusetts is at the Paul Revere Inn decorating the various rooms and completing for prizes. Belle Graham, the crossword puzzle editor for The Evening Crier, is looking at books in the inn's library when she finds a handmade book of crossword puzzles that a mother made for her daughter. Belle decides to see if she can find out who the mother and daughter were.

Belle's husband, private investigator Roscoe Polycrates is involved in locating a stolen copy of Longfellow's Paul Revere's Ride that was attached to the wall of the inn. Twelve year old E.T. Whitman, who was hired to clear the snow from the inn, watches the guests to make sure nobody sneaks out with the poem. One morning the poem is back on the wall but, E.T. believes it is a forgery and when they take the poem off the wall, they find a hidden compartment in the frame. While Roscoe tracks down the thieves, E.T. helps Belle with the puzzles and gives her the clue she needs to figure out who the mother was who made the book and its puzzles.

Readers who like to do crossword puzzles will find this book A CROSSWORD DELIGHT. The puzzles are hard to solve because the clues center around the 1940's when the puzzle maker constructed them. It is fun to read a regional cozy that has no violence, gore or murders in the storyline yet still grips the reader. Although E.T. is a secondary character he plays a major role in helping Roscoe and Belle. Once again Nero Blanc constructs a clever and witty mystery.

Harriet Klausner