All That Glitters: The Sgt. Windflower Mystery Series Book 13

I hope you have been reading the Sgt. Windflower Mystery series since the beginning but if you haven't, that is okay, it just gives you more books to add to your to be read pile and another great author to follow.All That Glitters is the thirteenth book in the Sgt. Windflower Mystery series and Windflower is trying to slow his life down. He has left his job as Sergeant of the RCMP, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and has accepted a job as a Community Safety Officer. He will be working along side his best friend's wife. Eddie Tizzard and Carrie Evanchuk worked for Windflower and both have continued elsewhere but Carrie will be back to work with Windflower. And Windflower's right hand gal, Betsy, will again be working her magic looking after everything in the office.Unfortunately Windflower is being pulled back in when a dead body is discovered at the Bed and Breakfast that Windflower and his wife Sheila run. And things get even worse when Dr. Sanjay does the autopsy and finds the cause of death to be interanl bleeding from tears caused by a bag of diamonds breaking in the deceased stomach. And when Dr. Sanjay is kidnapped Windflower steps up to work along side Eddie as Eddie has recently been appointed as Inspector when the new Inspector dies after an accident.Things are a lot different for Windflower and Eddie as Windflower was Eddie's boss before he changed positions and the two do not get much time to figure things out before they are thrown into the case.....but both men will do whatever it takes to save Sanjay as well as catch the criminals.Martin, as always, will have readers on the edge of their seats reading this latest installment in the Sgt. Windflower Mystery series. The characters in the books come alive in your mind and you will wish they were real and you could tag along.....but reading the book and jumping into the story will be exciting enough. Martin has always been able to open readers mind and capture your imagination and run with it. I cannot get enough of this series and LOVE where Martin takes the story.

Canadian novelist Mike Martin is well known for his distinctive series of stories set in in the small community of Grand Bank, Newfoundland, and featuring aboriginal RCMP officer Winston Windflower, his family, co-workers and friends.In his twelfth outing we find Windflower on the verge of quitting his job as detachment Sergeant, and devoting himself full-time to his family and making a go of the B&B he had his wife Sheila have purchased. Both the community and the RCMP are reluctant to let him go, and he has agreed to serve as Community Safety Officer in the village, reassuring everyone that his expertise will still be available.But Windflower’s vision of a more relaxed life comes to a shuddering halt when one of the guests in his B&B is found dead in his room.Luckily Windflower know just who to call on. Corporal Eddie Tizzard is based in the area detachment at Marystown, and Windfloswer’s old friend, Dr Sanjay, although now in his eighties, has continued to do double duty as the local coroner in cases of suspicious or sudden deaths. A search of the dead man’s room turns up nearly two dozen bottle of pills, all in prescription bottles, and all issued to the deceased, one Robert Smart.Before long Eddie Tizzard comes up with some interesting background information on the dead man. It turns out there was an Interpol warrant for his arrest, and he was wanted by several other European police forces as well, on suspicion of diamond smuggling. A plane ticket among his belongings indicated he was bound for Saint Pierre, a French possession off the coast of Newfoundland with direct flights to Paris.As lines of investigation open up, Inspector Diane Forsythe, arrives on the scene. She is finding her feet after recently being appointed as area detachment commander. Windflower is headed back to Marystown when he witnesses her car hit a moose on the highway. She is seriously injured, and Tizzard is appointed to replace her until matters become more clear. Meanwhile, the autopsy on Robert Smart reveals that he died from internal bleeding, caused when a plastic pouch of diamonds became torn, and the diamonds perforated his intestines. Not surprisingly, before long two strangers show up in the village, looking for Smart. And more concerning, Dr Sanjay disappears. It soon becomes a race against time to find the elderly doctor and solve a crime with international dimensions.Many readers are already familiar with the Windflower series, and the many colourful characters who inhabit the tiny village of Grand Bank. They all make an appearance, from the immediate Windflower clan of Winston, and his wife Sheila Hillier, to their two young children, Stella and Amelia Louise, as well as the family pets, Lady, a collie, and a standoffish cat with whom Windflower has an uneasy alliance. There are also the local townspeople, and references to Winston’s native-based practices of ceremonial smudging and communing with his elders through the practice of dream weaving. It all makes for an engaging portrayal of maritime life rapidly disappearing from the Canadian landscape which many readers will find captivating._______In addition to being a crime novelist, Jim Napier is a professional reviewer with over six hundred reviews to his credit.

Sgt. Winston Windflower has resigned from the RMCP and taken up a new post as the Community Safety Officer in Grand Bank, Newfoundland.Carrie Evanchuck is assigned by the RMCP to liaise with Windflower and the communities involved.As always family, food and good friends feature. I fairly drool from the food descriptions. The girls are growing up, are lively and greatly loved. Windflower’s loving patience is a gift to behold. His relationship with wife Shiela Hillier is solid and respectful.Martin has a way of easing elements into the book that can be thought provoking, gently joyous, and fascinating.Wildflower’s smudging and ceremonial smoking practices, important to keep him centred, are a gateway into First Nations practices and beliefs.The reference to the faceless dolls great Uncle Frank brings for Windflower’s daughters are a reminder not only of those beliefs and stories, but of the many missing First Nations women of Canada.All this combined with an unexplained death at Windflower’s B&B, a kidnapping, diamond smuggling and other events have Windflower unwillingly entrenched in RMCP activities than he wants to be. After all as a private citizen if anything happens to him there are no benefits in such situations. There’s bewildering changes in RCMP leadership and an accidental death that raises some eyebrows.Couple all the action, peppered with quotes from both the Bard and Tagore, wisdom from Windflower’s dreaming and the wise, often enigmatic spirits he meets there, and we have another great Windflower read!My thanks to the author for this ARC(Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.)

I'm a fan of the Sgt. Windflower Mystery Series and this was my favorite one I've read so far. Keep it up Mike.

Mike Martin has written a very entertaining mystery with interesting elements of indigenous practice and foodie recipes (yum!). Sgt Wildflower & Cpl. Tizzard are great family men with young rambunctious kids who fill out their lives and bring them the note of caution they need to survive their hairier encounters. Highly r3commend.