Intrepid part-time caterer/sleuth Faith Fairchild (The Body in the Moonlight) vacations with her family on an island off the coast of Maine, but they don't get much relaxation. Ill feelings between year-round residents and summer visitors reach a crisis when a developer is found dead near the lighthouse. Faith investigates, with the usual spine-tingling results. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Refurbishing a cottage on Sanpere Island off the coast of Maine, caterer Faith Fairchild, her minister husband Tom, and their two lively kids, Amy and Ben, settle in for the summer with Faith's best friend Pix's mother, octogenarian Ursula Rowe, and are soon up to their lobster bibs in local gossip. The Hamiltons and the Prescotts have been feuding for generations in a continuation of the age-old lobster wars over who gets to trap where. Flamboyant real-estate agent Persis Sanford and hard-nosed Harold Hapswell, the developer of Sanpere Shores, an enclave of millionaires' homes, are at odds when Persis isn't too busy browbeating her unwanted son Kenny. And the ecoterrorists of KSS (Keep Sanpere Sanpere) are setting fires and scrawling graffiti in an attempt to keep Sanpere from turning into another Martha Stewartized Bar Harbor. Then Hapswell dies, maybe accidentally, maybe not, and Persis succumbs to a furious barrage of stab wounds. Faith, who divides her leisure between sauces and corpses (The Body in the Bonfire, 2002, etc.), unfortunately turns up in the wrong place several times, earning first a mild concussion and then captivity in duct tape while she and the disrupter of Sanpere harmony set out to sea for a watery resolution. A return visit to Sanpere (The Body in the Basement, 1994) that features down-east directions to tourists ("You can't get there from here") and induces cravings for crab cakes and comfort cookies (recipes included). It's all as cozy as any hand-knit shawl by the Sanpere Sewing Circle. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Developers and environmentalists do battle over a deserted lighthouse in Page's 13th absorbing "body" book (after 2002's The Body in the Bonfire) to feature Faith Fairchild, caterer, sometime sleuth and mother of two small children. Faith and her minister husband, Tom, who live most of the year in Aleford, Mass., are fixing up their cottage on Maine's Sanpere Island, where "mansionization"-the construction of trophy houses by rich summer people-is making the locals resentful. One evening the falling tide reveals the body of developer Harold Hapswell "wedged between two granite ledges at the base of the old lighthouse... as if he'd been filed between the two large rocks." Suspecting Hapswell's death was no accident, Faith has her worst fears confirmed when she herself is attacked on a walk near the lighthouse. Beneath the tranquil and festive summer activities, including the island-wide Fish and Fritter Fry and an amateur production of Romeo and Juliet, lurk arson and murder. Along with thematically related recipes, the author appends a moving afterword about the impact of September 11 on the novel's composition. This is an ideal beach read for cozy fans heading for the shore this summer. Agent, Faith Hamlin. (May 13) FYI: Page's short story "The Would-Be Widower" recently won an Agatha Award. (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

When caterer Faith Fairchild leaves the Massachusetts parsonage where her husband is pastor for a new summer cottage on Sanpere Island in Maine, she's not prepared for its woefully unfinished state. But that allows her family to stay with her friend Pix's lovely and wise mother, Ursula, who knows everyone on the island. With an environmental group fighting hard--and sometimes nastily--to keep development at bay, the apparent drowning of a developer at the foot of the picturesque lighthouse raises questions. Through a summer full of set pieces--the local theater production of Romeo and Juliet, the ancient family feuds, the natives who eschew even electricity, and the siren lure of Home Depot--another murder and other mysteries unfold. Through it all, Faith cooks, keeps her arms around her children and stalwart spouse, and gets a hefty dose of local color, recipes included. Pleasant cozy fare, although the trend of casting environmentalists as bad guys has become an epidemic. --GraceAnne A. DeCandido