Second up in my promise to read a story a day in the month in the month of May is Sheila Connolly’s “Kept in the Dark.” A nominee for this year’s Agatha Award for Best Short Story, the story—set against the backdrop of a mushroom growing operation in Southeastern Pennsylvania—offers a dead body, a couple of investigators (including a tall, dark, and handsome forensics expert), and a surprise solution to the crime, but the tale makes a couple of nicely twisty departures from the expected trajectory of the whodunit. Juliette Adamson, owner of the mushroom farm (actually caves, as she points out), is both charming and clever—and a nice match for “Mr. CSI-GQ,” as she calls him early on. Plus, the background info on mushrooms that Connolly weaves into the story is fascinating in its own right. I’m not a fan of fungi myself (yuck!), but the story itself proves simply delicious. — Art Taylor
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Haha! I was clear on what smelled (and more importantly, what didn’t). Not sure about the exact locale, but I can ask Sheila when I see her this weekend!
Does it take place in Kennet Square, PA? Renee and I drive through there every time we visit her mother. You can smell it from the MD-PA border… 🙂
After re-reading my own comment, just to be clear: you can smell the town from the MD-PA border, not my mother-in-law. 🙂