Tori has just received a mysterious CD of the band’s recordings in the mail, strangely enough, from Clifton Weaver, who must have mailed the CD just before he was murdered.  On the CD, along with songs rumored to have been written by her grandfather, is a ballad in which an unnamed woman confesses to the murder of Belle Morgan who disappeared many years earlier. 

With some careful listening, Tori is able to locate Belle’s body after many years, and with a bit of genealogical sleuthing is able to unravel Belle’s murder, figure out her grandfather’s part in the Morgan Family Players and is also able to help a willing Sheriff Mort Joachim solve Clifton Weaver’s murder, something the former sheriff, now Tori’s stepfather, Colin Brooke, would never have allowed.  

Blood Ballad is a comfortable cozy, with an engaging heroine who deftly balances her family, her job, as curator of New Kassell’s historical museum, with her love of genealogy and local history. Tori can turn almost anything into a hunt for ancestors and does with such enthusiasm that it may cause many readers to start digging up their family bibles to search for their relatives. 

Tori’s story moves back and forth between the past and present easily and past events are neatly tied into the present, and long though forgotten memories, some pleasant, some not so pleasant, are dusted off. Tori’s husband is very patient of her historical sleuthing, but often wishes she would stick to bodies that are already long gone and buried. A warm and welcoming town draws readers in and encourages them to stay a bit. While some may find the pace of the mystery a bit slow to their liking, others will enjoy the historically complex, and personal stories Tori and her friends and family weave.                                                                

--Jennifer Monahan Winberry