CAROLINA GOLD

By Douglas McBriarty

St. Martins Press (1991)

Reviewed by Bob Thompson 4/15/91

Boy, am I late with this review...Sorry folks, I read it over three months ago, lost the book before I could review it, had a lifestyle change that cut out most of my free time and finally found the book again a couple of weeks ago. This is going to be a pretty sad excuse for a review, since I've forgotten most of the details and don't have time to re read the book.

The plot in a nutshell: A young couple find a fairly good deposit of gold in the mountains of North Carolina. They open a shop in a nearby town where they make and sell jewelry out of the gold from their mine. The male half of the couple disappears. Has he just split, has he had an accident, or is perhaps something more sinister afoot? The local sheriff and his faithful Indian sidekick/deputy investigate, and finally with the very able assistance of another Indian who happens to be an expert on gold and a few other esoteric things, the case is solved. Who dunnit? I forgot, and it doesn't really matter.

This book is what I would describe as a typical little murder mystery, and as such, it is a category that I rarely read. I went through most of the Agatha Christie books about 20 years ago (Gad!!! has it been that long?) and that has been about it for me in this genre.

The only reason that I read this book was because I have been in the mining business and the jewelry business, so there was some personal interest in the way that the author would handle that aspect of things.

It turned out to be an enjoyable book and amazingly accurate in some of the details. The characters are well developed in a short time, and although they are stereotypical, you know what?... The stereotypes are right on.

Every character in the book perfectly matches someone that I have been acquainted with in real life in similar situations. The same jealous, cutthroat competitors, The same earnest small town law enforcement officers, the same reclusive hill folk, the Native American with unexpected depths of knowledge, and the small town locals that resent the new people in town. I liked it and I think you will too.

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