Miss Dimple Suspects

In Ballard’s quietly engaging third mystery set during WWII (after 2011’s Miss Dimple Rallies to the Cause), Miss Dimple Kilpatrick, first-grade teacher at Elderberry (Ga.) grammar school, is quickly able to track a child lost in the woods to a remote farmhouse where she’s being well cared for by reclusive artist Mae Martha Hawthorne and Mae’s Asian companion, Suzy. Several days later, someone bludgeons Mae to death, and Mae’s paintings, which have been increasing in value, disappear. Suspicion in the xenophobic town immediately falls on the missing Suzy, who’s Japanese and named Suzu Amaya. Miss Dimple, practical and resolute, enlists the aid of two other primary school teachers to find Suzy, the canvases, and the murderer. They bungle their way through copious misadventures, putting themselves at grave risk. While a little too sweetly nostalgic and filled with stock characters, the book retains some bite and a few surprises. Agent: Laura Langlie, Laura Langlie Agency. (Jan.)