Shadows on the Ivy

An Antique Print Mystery

By: Lea Wait

Narrated by: Celeste Lawson

Length: 7 hrs and 46 mins

Publisher's summary

Maggie Summer has three loves: her antique print business, Shadows; her career as a community college professor in Somerset County, New Jersey; and the new man in her life, Will Brewer. Her biological clock is pushing her to decide whether she's ready to add a fourth love: an adopted child.

Although Will is on the road just now, Maggie's life is full. She uses prints by Currier & Ives, Thomas Nast, and William Ludwell Sheppard to illustrate her lectures on American cultural history, and Oliver and Dorothy Whitcomb, a wealthy couple who are on the college board, are two of her best customers.

When the Whitcombs design and dedicate a special dormitory for single parents and their children, Maggie is thrilled to become the faculty adviser to the young parents. Her new assignment gives her plenty of time to think about what single parenthood would mean for her; that is, plenty of time until one of the young mothers is poisoned and the web of danger at the dorm threatens to encircle Maggie.

There is a killer on campus. Is it an outsider or someone Maggie knows and trusts? Does someone want to destroy Whitcomb House or the college? And is Maggie in as much danger as her students?

As always, Maggie finds the answers to her questions in the antique prints she knows and loves. And this time, torn between her own needs and those of her students, the most important discoveries Maggie makes are about herself.

Rich with appealing characters and fascinating insiders' lore about antique prints, Shadows on the Ivy is the best yet in this award-nominated series from an author who brilliantly brings together her knowledge of prints and her love of storytelling.

©2004 Eleanor S. Wait (P)2004 Blackstone Audiobooks

Critic reviews

"Enjoyable....Wait's knowledge of antique prints and American culture will entertain and educate readers." (Publishers Weekly)
"Maggie is an extremely attractive protagonist." (Booklist)

childless angst

The mystery in this book gets lost between the angst the protagonist has about somehow getting a child (even though she is already so busy that she can't find time to get to the grocery store) and long lectures on early american prints. When I read, I read to relax and not be hit over the head over and over about how much someone wants a child and apparently can't decide how to obtain one. the maudlin longing makes a child sound like a possession, without any real understanding of what being a parent is all about. From what this woman imagines in the book she should really get a puppy. In addition the reader is "treated" to lectures about early american prints which may or may not be legitimate, but are certainly annoying in the middle of a mystery. The beginning of each chapter has a description of an early american print which does not seem to bear on the contents of the chapter itself. Margaret Maron uses the same tool much more effectively with excepts of books at the beginning of the chapters. Really not worth listening too. I also listened to Shadows on the Coast of Maine, it was better because the lectures were gone, but the longing for a child was still there. AAAHHHH!