MARLENE SATTER - MOSTLY MYSTERY REVIEWS

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	Marlene Satter is one of FMAM's fiction editors. Making sure copy is in the best possible shape before it sees print has been her job and her mission for years; doing so for FMAM's fine writers is a pleasure.  So is reviewing books to let folks know about all the "good stuff" that's available.

TEA AND WITCHERY
Tea and Witchery
Marie Dees
Hard Shell Word Factory, 2005 (paperback), $, 236 pp.
ISBN: 0-7599-4760-0

In this thoroughly engaging mystery, Lynn has come to visit her elderly aunt in Cassadaga, Florida, hoping that as she reconnects with Anthea she can figure out what to do with her life. A young widow with a job lost to a dot-com gone bust, she needs a new direction. But Lynn has no idea that Cassadaga is renowned as a spiritualist community, nor is she prepared for the turmoil that greets her as soon as she arrives in the Victorian town: a fire in the community building and a squabble over "signs." The signs, she learns, are indications from the spirit world that a person has psychic powers - something a would-be resident must have in order to stay, join the Society, and hang out a shingle as an approved practicing psychic.

As the police investigate what turns out to be a suspicious fire, the situation quickly escalates. Alex, in town to write his book, finds the president of the Society dead. Someone has put Devil's Trumpet in his tea - tea prepared by Anthea and delivered by Lynn and Patrick. But there are plenty more suspects. Myra, one of the town psychics, pits herself against Colleen, a Wiccan, even as she schemes to have Patrick, another psychic, thrown out of the Society. Lisle, George, and Wallingford are all jockeying for signs so that they can stay in Cassadaga - and George knew Lynn in college. Alex has told no one what his book is about. And Joshua is trying to protect Patrick's position in the Society, because the two are an item.

Patrick matter-of-factly "sees" Alex and Lynn as a couple, and tells them so. Neither is ready for this tall blond Cupid to make a match of them, however, and the would-be romance stumbles along as Lisle announces that the angels have a message for Carl's killer. After a reading in which Lisle delivers messages to everyone, and does not reveal the identity of the murderer, psychics and Wiccans alike are left wondering what will happen next. They don't have long to wait. Lynn goes to the lake early the next morning to paint the tranquil scene, but finds instead that she has included a mysterious white form - a form that turns out to be Lisle's body, floating in the lake.

Readers with a taste for the supernatural will be delighted with this charming book as it hurtles itself along a road with plenty of bumps. The characters are chatty and eccentric, the plot twists and turns, and the fascinating setting of the town itself lends its own personality to the tale. Secrets and town politics make for plenty of intrigue, and Patrick's guileless insistence on a budding relationship between Lynn and Alex adds just enough romantic spice to the story. Murder, romance, ghosts, and atmosphere; what more could a reader want?

Marlene Satter

URBAN SHAMAN
Urban Shaman
C. E. Murphy
Luna Books, 2005, $13.95, 344 pp.
ISBN: 0-373-80223-4

Joanne Walker is on her way home from her mother's funeral, on a redeye flight to Seattle. She's tired, she's stressed, and her contacts are bothering her. And then she sees the woman as the plane descends on its landing approach. The woman is running desperately, fleeing a pack of dogs - and heading straight for a man with a silver blade.

Now Joanne, nearly six feet tall, is a mechanic. She fixes things. She happens to work for the police department in Seattle, but that's really just incidental to her repair work. She thinks. Until she decides to intervene and rescue that woman - and finds that things suddenly get very, very strange.

The woman she's trying to help is fleeing the Wild Hunt. To save her, Joanne has to take on the Horned God, Cernunnos himself - and she very nearly ends up dead, run through with his sword. But that's when things get even stranger, because a coyote appears and tells her to heal herself. Joanne finds herself turning into a very different kind of fixit person - a shaman.

Cernunnos and the Wild Hunt were bound away, but something has released them. And if Joanne can't discover what it is, and find a way to bind them once more, they will be free to ride and ravage forever. She has three days to learn how to use her shaman's powers, and to find the solution. And she hasn't had a heck of a lot of sleep.

This book moves along at a breakneck pace, blending Celtic and Native American lore into a terrific tale about an eminently likable heroine whose pragmatism wars with her reluctance to accept a heritage she long ago denied. Learning to accept herself and her ancestry is also a form of healing, and as Joanne puts together the fragments of her heritage, she may have found a way to heal more than her own psyche. One can only hope that another book featuring Joanne Walker is already in the works, because this writer is far too good to put down.

Marlene Satter

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