Jeanne
of the Bookblogof the Bristol Library is back today with
her latest review…
Treadmill
Books: The Dream Club Mysteries by Mary
Kennedy
Taylor Blake has spent years as a business
consultant, but now her expertise is needed a little closer to home:
her younger sister Allison has opened Oldies but Goodies, a shop featuring
classic candies, and things are not going well.
Allison has always been the creative one, but her attention span is
somewhat short. Taylor’s job is to try
to get the store on a sound footing and keep Allison from throwing in the
towel. The shop also serves as the
meeting place for the Dream Club, a group which meets regularly to discuss
their dreams and possible meanings.
As part of the campaign to save Oldies but Goodies,
Taylor proposes cross promotion with some of the other merchants in the
area. One of them, a smarmy dance
instructor, soon ends up dead—definitely not good for business in the area—and
especially not good as he had been hitting on both Allison and Taylor.
That’s the plot of Nightmares Can Be Murder,
the first in the Dream Club Mystery series. The hook is the dream interpretation aspect,
and given that the author is a clinical psychologist I felt the dream aspect
would be handled professionally. The
Dream Club usually provides some clues to the crimes, but also offers many different
interpretations that can help or hinder the investigation.
I particularly enjoyed the candy descriptions in the
first book; it was a real walk down Memory Lane. The mention of Mallow Cups, Smoothies,
colored wax lips, Clark Bars, and Zagnuts all brought back childhood memories—even
if I didn’t eat them, I remembered seeing them in the candy section. I also
liked the brainstorming about how to promote and publicize the shop, which
seemed well considered. Since the
library is often involved in cross promotion, I could well understand the
nuances. Both these aspects were more prominent in the first book and to tell
the truth, I rather missed them. I
understand that I’m probably the only person who did. They also had to
carefully consider the realities of location:
soft chocolates would melt in the Savannah heat during the summer, for
example, so not a good choice for an outdoor promotion. Little details such as
that charmed me.
The dream interpretation was interesting, allowing
for some paranormal as well as psychological interpretations. Some valuable clues show up, but often in
vague forms. Club members do a bit of
free association to try to illuminate some details.
I’ve read two of the three in the series, and for me
the weakness is in the characters. They
never came alive for me. Allison is
impractical but creative. Taylor is
sensible (except when she isn’t, at one point in the first book) and businesslike. The members of the Dream Club also fall into
broad categories. Since I’m a character
oriented reader for the most part, I just never quite got involved with
books. The plots are fine, the dreams
are interesting, but I didn’t feel compelled to rush out and get the next book.
As treadmill books, they worked okay. They kept me reading but didn’t inspire any
extra steps. The same author has a series set in talk radio, which I may try as
well.
Titles in the series:
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