A Widow’s Curse: A Fever Devilin Novel
by Phillip Depoy
Published by St. Martins
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Reviewed by Kathy Perschmann
DePoy is an actor and theatre director who began writing in 1997. He is also the author of the Flap Tucker and the Fever Devilin mysteries. This is the fourth Devilin book.
Dr. Fever Devilin is tramping around in his garden in the mountains of Georgia, his fiancée and best friend both out of town, when he gets a call about an old silver coin or medallion. Carl Schultz’s father bought the coin from a widow in Devilin’s town of Blue Mountain, about 15 or 20 years ago, and now has been referred by the university to Dr. Devilin to learn more about the medallion.
Fever does miss the research as he had been laid off when his Department of Folklore was closed, and he talks Carl Schultz into driving up with a colleague, Dr. Winton Andrews. The three men hit it off over good food, interesting stories and apple brandy. Drs. Andrews and Devilin go off to nearby Pine City to talk to a lawyer, and while they are gone, someone murders Schultz in Devilin’s living room. The coin seems to be related to the Devilin family. His great grandfather had bought three things at an auction many years before, and the sale of one of them, a painting of a woman, had put Fever through college. The other item was a Cherokee artifact. Curses, both Welsh and Cherokee, as well as madness, ghosts, and tangled family histories play a big part in this tale.
The facts that Fever uncovers bring him revelations about his distant ancestors and his parents. Good friends Winton Andrews and Sheriff Skidmore assist in many ways.
Armchair Interviews says: This well written and unusual mystery set in Georgia will make you yearn for southern cooking and more of DePoy’s books.
Author’s Web site: http://www.PhillipDepoy.com