Antiques Flee Market [Mass Market Paperback]

Following her divorce, Brandy Borne moved back in with her mother, Vivian, in her hometown of Serenity. Much to her chagrin, the first thing they did together was attend a mother-daughter meeting of the local Red Hat Club. (Mystery readers all, the local branch has been named The Red-Hatted League.) Vivian couldn't go with Brandy's much-older sister Peggy Sue (they were both named after popular songs of their day) because Peggy Sue was already a member.

Before her arrival, Peg informed Brandy that Vivian sold off most of her prized possessions to an antique dealer while on a "drug holiday" from her bipolar meds. When the antique dealer was found dead -- and both Brandy and Vivian admitted to running over the body in their car -- it was up to the Borne girls to sift through the other suspects (the dealer was known for taking advantage of citizens) and find the real killer. This story was told in the first "Trash 'n' Treasures" book, Antiques Roadkill.

Since then, they've become amateur sleuths of a sort, investigating murders in their formerly quiet little Midwestern hometown and generally causing havoc of one sort or another while getting in the way of genuine police investigation. The second book in the series, Antiques Maul, is Halloween-themed. It concerns Brandy's trying to keep Vivian out of trouble by opening a booth at the local antiques mall, then finding a woman dead, presumably by her pit bull.

The third book in the series is Antiques Flee Market. Now it's Christmastime, and a former "conquest" of Vivian's (a "mercy mission" during wartime) has been found dead in his nursing-home bed.

Along for the search this time is the victim's British, Goth granddaughter, Chaz, an ex-con with less than savory friends and a delightfully Cockney way of speaking. Meanwhile, Brandy is troubled by an anonymous note that suggests Vivian is not her real mother, and Vivian is excited by news that she is no longer bipolar but merely schizo-affective (which is actually bipolar with psychotic tendencies).

Antiques Flee Market shows a marked improvement over the first book in the series, which I was actually unable to finish (I skipped the followup). The prose here is smoother, with very little sign of one author taking over for the other. The Collinses work well together as "Barbara Allan," and even the humor -- which definitely felt inserted into Antiques Roadkill -- is much more seamlessly integrated, making for a genuinely funny read (as opposed to simply a joke-filled one).

Fans of co-author Max Allan Collins will appreciate a couple of touches that must have come from him: namely a Mike Hammer reference and the fact that the antique this time around is a rare edition of Tarzan by Edgar Rice Burroughs (the "sleuth" Collins used for his Disaster series book The Pearl Harbor Murders). But all in all, "Barbara Allan" is really coming into her own, and the Trash 'n' Treasures series has to be the quirkiest cozy series on the market.

In fact, in many ways, the Collinses seem to be turning the classic tropes of the cozy subgenre on their ear. After all, the Bornes aren't independently wealthy; their dog is diabetic, blind, and named after raw fish; they're highly dependent on psychiatric medications just for their daily functioning (with disastrously funny results if, for example, they get their pill boxes confused); and their antiques are solely low-rent, flea-market fare (Mother is not averse to Dumpster diving) that clearly falls under the heading of the series' inspiration, the adage "One man's trash is another man's treasure."

In short, unlike most escapist fiction protagonists, the Bornes do not have a life to which it is likely the reader will aspire (except perhaps for those readers who should be, but aren't already, on psych meds). It more closely resembles horror fiction in that the events make you feel better about your own life.

Of course, I could be off on my facts a bit there, given that I wouldn't even have heard of this series if it weren't co-written by one of my favorite authors. But Antiques Flee Market actually turned out to be quite a fun read. Each chapter ends with an (often tongue-in-cheek) antique-buying tip, and the couple have a delightfully wicked sense of humor (dig that soap-opera-derived cliffhanger ending!). I'm already looking forward to reading the fourth book in the series, Antiques Bizarre.

Barbara Allan is the pseudonym for the husband-and-wife writing team of Max Allan Collins and Barbara Collins. This is the third in the delightful Trash `n' Treasures series.

The charming Brandy Borne has retuned home to her small Midwestern hometown of Serenity to live with her elderly mother. The two women are running an antique stall in the town and are visiting a special flea market to buy stock when they run into Walter Yeager selling some of his belongings. He is trying to help out Chaz, a newly discovered granddaughter, the product of a wartime romance in England.

Chaz is real character, but hits it off with Brandy and her mother Vivian when they prevent Walter from selling a valuable first-edition Tarzan book for less than it is worth. Then a theft distracts everyone, but Brandy is astute enough to realize that Chaz knows something, and follows up on it and gets the money back. When she meets Chaz at the trailer park where she lives with her grandfather, they discover Walter dead, apparently a heart attack. Vivian is convinced it is murder, and when Chaz is arrested, she is convinced she is innocent. Vivian's meddling in the investigation pulls in Brandy, and the two manage to confound and irritate the local police. They also manage to put themselves in danger, as usual.

The fast pace, amusing characters, and unusual plot make this light and cozy mystery a winner.

Armchair Interview says: A fun read with fun characters.

If this isn't the worst book ever written (then I don't know what book is). The author(s) completely overuse and misuse (the parenthesis marks) throughout the entire book, deprecate and self-deprecate themselves (constantly)(if you know what I mean) and have (generally speaking) written a book that is totally and completely devoid of any plot, fun, or sensibility for being (whatsoever). Read it (if you must) but definitely don't buy it (check it out at the library), then wonder why you didn't pay attention (to this book review). Forewarned (is forearmed).