Murder Old and New

A Better Days Mystery

By: Laurie Williamson, Chet Williamson

Narrated by: Mary Ann Jacobs

An aged photograph of a dead man hanging from a tree...

Deaths in a nursing home that may not be as natural as they appear...

Clues showing a 70-year-old suicide could be murder...

Sinister small town secrets, decades old, finally revealed...

Feisty Livy Crowe, single-and-loving-it owner of the nostalgia shop, Better Days, has to deal with all of these and more, including her mother's slow deterioration in a senior residence that might be a crime scene, a very awkward romantic triangle, and murders old and new that threaten even Livy herself...

I was so engaged in this slick, clever mystery, I nearly burned the house down, having forgotten I had something cooking on the stove. Murder Old and New by Laurie and Chet Williamson is so riveting and swiftly paced you almost hate to arrive at the solution because you hate to lose the narrator's voice.

Sharp writing, excellent characterization and a satisfying conclusion should put this at the top of your listening list. - Joe R. Lansdale

©2020 Laurie and Chet Williamson (P)2020 David N. Wilson

Kind of a Cozy Mystery

I enjoyed this book and the main character, Livvy is believable. The author weaves the tale to hold your attention throughout. If you like a whodunit without bad language you will enjoy this!

Modern Murder Across Time/Age

This is the stuff. I really enjoyed Murder Old and New. Narrator Mary Ann Jacobs has an engaging enthusiastic voice. It starts with a chilling photograph of macabra death that is eerie and inexplicable leading our hero resale shop maven who haunts her mother's elder home to explore clues from the past and deal with the gang. The parallels between pop culture, aging, and murder are apt and fun (maybe people are like pjotographs in the scrapebook all aging differently). The plot based on past clues to a current unease is layered and smart. It's told with modern sensibilities and in time I found it was also refreshingly old fashioned to a point a reveal is foreshadowed and crouched in parallels to film and books it reflects on nostalgically (I might have liked to keep an eye out for more parallels, what I though was just pop culture embellishment might have been meta storytelling). I really enjoyed this one.

PLOT TWIST.

I’m 126 book into 2024 and this is easily in my top 10. Mystery, intensity, but not scary. Such a fun read/listen on a dreary rainy day.
And gosh, WHAT A PLOT TWIST. There’s a few, but the biggest one is absolutely HUGE.