"Killer Stuff" by Sharon Fiffer

Get your head out of your collectors' guides and enjoy a novel in which the main characters are pottery and buttons!

Book Review: "Killer Stuff" by Sharon Fiffer

Like most of us, picker Jane Wheel dreams of finding a Fulper gem in a five dollar box of planters. Or a battered sewing box tagged two dollars, and crammed with bakelite buttons. Unlike most of us, Jane's passion for pottery lands her in the middle of a murder investigation.

The characters in this mystery are reasonably engaging, and the story compelling enough to stick with, but the real stars of Sharon Fiffer's Killer Stuff are McCoy flower pots, Roseville vases, and Jade-ite dishes, as well as the art of antique hunting itself.

Those of us who buy and/or sell antiques will be sure to recognize ourselves in characters who spend Friday evenings combing the classifieds, ranking estate and yard sales for proximity and promise. Or who are subject to shortness of breath and hacking coughs due to "pickers disease" contracted after years of sifting through boxes of moldy books, tins of rusty utensils, and mountains of prizes in dusty attics and damp basements. Certainly none of us will admit to identifying with Jane's despised "book guys," dealers who are ". . . all grabbers and pushers," who sweep quantities of books out of the reach of other dealers while then performing the blocking maneuvers of a particularly aggressive basketball center.

Whether you buy to sell or buy to keep, if you read novels as well as Collector Guides, you will enjoy this book. Sharon Fiffer understands how the game is played and how much we love to play it.

Killer Stuff

by Sharon Fiffer

c 2001

ISBN 0-312-27818-7

St. Martins' Press

175 Fifth Avenue

New York, NY 10010