Miss Dimple Disappears

Set in 1942 nearly a year after Pearl Harbor, Ballard's intriguing first in a new cozy series opens with Miss Dimple Kilpatrick, who's been a first grade teacher at the Elderberry (Ga.) Grammar School for almost 40 years, taking an early morning stroll through the town park. But why is a car with its headlights off following her? Soon after, the body of the school janitor turns up in a storage closet. Did the janitor, who had high blood pressure, die of a heart attack—or is something more sinister going on? When someone abducts Miss Dimple, grade-schooler Willie Elrod, who has "an inventive mind," tells his mother he saw "poor Miss Dimple being kidnapped by spies." Ballard (Hark! The Herald Angel Screamed and six other Augusta Goodnight mysteries) does a good job depicting a small American town as the factories gear up for war, young men enter the service, and everyone adjusts to rationing. (Dec.)