Book Review: Read and Gone by Allison Brook
- Kristen Lewendon
- Sep 4, 2019
- 2 min read
The Haunted Library Mysteries Book 2
Agatha Award Nominee
Right in time for the holidays, comes Allison Brook’s second Haunted Library mystery, a perfect present for readers of Jenn McKinlay and Leslie Meier.
Twenty million dollars’ worth of missing gems bring Carrie Singleton’s long-lost and larcenous dad back into her life and it’s up to Carrie to clear his name.
A devoted dad is as precious as diamonds, but Carrie Singleton wouldn’t know since her dad Jim’s been on the lam most of her life. In an unusual family reunion, she finds Jim breaking into her cottage in the middle of the night. The fun really starts when he begs her to help him recover his half of a twenty-million-dollar gem heist he pulled off with the local jeweler, Benton Parr. When she refuses, Jim takes off again.
Carrie finds her father again behind bars for the recent murder of Benton Parr. Who made the connection? Unbeknownst to her, Carrie’s boyfriend Dylan, an insurance investigator, has been searching for the gems. Determined to find the jewels herself, she starts examining every facet of Parr’s life. She turns up a treasure trove of suspects, one of whom bashes her on the head as she’s searching the victim’s country cabin.
Retreating to the quiet confines of the library where she works, Carrie watches as Smokey Joe, the resident cat, paws at a hole in the wall. Is he after the library’s ghost Evelyn, or something shinier? The second charming Haunted Library mystery by Allison Brook, Read and Gone will be a delight for fans of Jenn McKinlay and Leslie Meier.

My Review:
I can’t really say that the villain of this piece came as any kind of a surprise to me. But it was loads of fun trying to see where the mistakes would happen that would give away the identity of the culprit. It makes me sad to say there was something about this book that just didn’t quite work right for me, though. It was fun and funny, the characters were engaging, the mystery was properly convoluted, but… for a ‘haunted library’, there’s not a lot of “haunt” and even less “library”. It could be set in a community center – for the types of activities they’re always doing, it probably should be – and it wouldn’t significantly change the series. In spite of those things, I enjoyed this book immensely and I look forward to reading more about Carrie and her friends, family, and co-workers. And Smokey Joe. I read a borrowed copy of this book.
Other books in the series:

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