Carl's well-crafted fourth Jean Fairbairn/Alasdair Cameron mystery (after 2007's The Burning Glass
) takes Jean, a journalist for travel magazine Great Scot
, and Alasdair, a former detective, from Edinburgh to historic Williamsburg, Va. While attending a reception at a local museum, Jean spies the Witch Box, a 16th-century chest curiously missing its charm stone. The mystery behind the origin of the box heightens with the theft of a replica and the death of the replica's Williamsburg designer in a tragic accident. A myriad cast of characters adds plenty of suspects to the list of possible murderers after a body is discovered hanging from a tree on All Hallows Eve. Could the killer be a female professor who specializes in the arts of witchcraft or an eccentric man bent on proving that witchcraft and the supernatural don't exist? While detailed descriptions of various historical artifacts tend to slow the action, cozy fans should be satisfied. (Nov.)
