A Fatal Appraisal by J. B. Stanley (2006, Paperback)

What's not to like about a mystery with two eBay references by an author who eBays herself? I mean she herself is an eBayer, not that she's up for auction. But she does eBay, and she is up for auctions, according to her author blurb, and so are her characters.

The basic premise of A Collectible Mystery is that Molly Appleby, a writer for Collector's Weekly, is in Richmond, Virginia, to cover the taping of the hit antiques show Hidden Treasures (think Antiques Roadshow). The program features an exhibit of Civil War memorabilia, and crowds are lining up in hopes of making a killing with their old junk.

Meanwhile, Molly is getting to know the show's various appraisers, all of whom bear monikers that are alliterative to their specialties — e.g., Lindsay for linens, Tony for toys, Frank for furniture, etc. — except for snobbish British coins expert Alexandra. Then Frank turns up dead after inspecting a gorgeous 18th-century desk with unique hidden compartments. Molly finds the body and decides it's up to her to solve the crime.

As for what's not to like about this book, the editing errors are ridiculous and rife with malapropisms that lend unintentional hilarity. At one point, Molly is talking to the detective on the case and tries to think of a "poignant" question to ask (I think the author meant "pertinent" or "pointed"), and elsewhere in the book a character tries for "brevity" when the author means "levity". But most egregious is the spelling of "oy vey" as "oovay". I mean c'mon, that's not even phonetically correct! There are other minor grammatical errors as well.

And Molly is annoying in her unabashed narcissism — at one point she laments that she'll "never get to be a famous heroine" if she keeps getting interrupted in her sleuthing — with an annoyingly perfect love interest. Besides, what kind of halfway decent reporter is more interested in solving the crime than in reporting on it in the first place? It's also somewhat unbelievable that her mother agrees wholeheartedly that Molly should be the one to find the killer, with only the mild warning that "guilty people can be unpredictable."

But errors and annoyances aside, the characters are well drawn, the murder weapon is novel, the story is nicely plotted, and overall it's an enjoyable read. An appendix contains interesting information on secret compartments in antique furniture, and there are even pictures (although you can't see much, because they're too dark and grainy).

As for the eBay references, Tony the toy man tells a comic book collector that he saw a copy of his rare number one X-Men "go on eBay for just under a grand last week." And further along, Molly asks rhetorically what to do with stolen coins (not stolen by her, it's all part of the storyline), adding, "You can't just put them on eBay." Ah, but Molly, no doubt some have — and more will.

Molly's not the most likable mystery heroine, but I wouldn't mind reading J.B. Stanley's previous book in this series. Overall, it gets a B.

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