This is the first book I read in Barbara Graham's mystery series, although it is the second in the series. I was so intrigued by the name, I thought I'd give it a try. I fell hopelessly in love with book. I have now read all seven twice! The major characters are Tony and Theo Abernathy. He is the Sheriff for a tiny county in Tennessee backed up to the Great Smoky Mountains. She owns her own quilt shop and designs quilts and has published books about them. It is a typical small town, full of quirky characters and a lot of the minutiae of everyday life. In this particular book, a murder is committed by a flax hackle, an instrument that has a lot of spikes coming out of the back. It is used similar to an instrument that you would card wool and cotton on. It was found in the storage area for the new folk museum, hence the name of artifact. I love the way Ms. Graham weaves the tales of the various people in Park County into a cohesive story. They are an engaging bunch for the most part along with some really evil ones. For example, I like Marmot the Varmint, the man who loves trash. He runs the local dump and stinks worse than it does. And then there is Blossom Flowers, the obese woman that bakes pies that are fit for heaven and has a huge crush on Tony. There is also Wade, his deputy, who throws up automatically whenever he sees a dead body. Then he is okay to take pictures, dust for fingerprints, whatever. He's also drop dead gorgeous which can create all sorts of problems. There are dozens more characters, each unique. They evolve like real people do over the series. Not all the story lines get cleaned up by the end of the book. There are usually ones that get solved in the next book, or maybe the one after. That seems natural to me. There is also a mystery quilt pattern for the brave.
It all boils down to the fact that I love this book as well as the six others! I highly recommend it.

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