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Odelia Grey, a 47 year old size 20 paralegal works mostly for Michael R. Steele, Esq. a very dislikable partner in the law firm for which she works. Her lover, Greg, has proposed and has given her until he returns from a business trip, to decide. Sterling Price, a long time client of the law firm, has some papers to be notarized, and asks that Odelia bring them to his office early the next day. She arrives at 8:30 and has a cup of very special coffee with this urbane, gentle man. Price shows Odelia his lunch box collection and especially his most prized possession, the "Holy Pail". Although lunch boxes had been around since the 19th century when working men carried their lunches to work in a pail, and during the early part of the 20th century, when tobacco companies sold their product in lunch box like tins, the first purpose made lithographed lunch box was a Mickey Mouse black and white one during the 1930s. The idea sort of waned after that. It wasn't until after WW II that some bright young marketer thought of making lunch boxes with thermos bottles in them for children and putting a decal or lithograph on the side. What Price showed Odelia was the prototype lunch box, in this case, showing "Chappy Wheeler" a cowboy star who was murdered in 1949. So, of course, this lunch box never went into production. The Holy Pail was supposedly cursed. All previous owners had apparently died under mysterious conditions, including Sterling Price who is found dead that same afternoon. Odelia who had been very taken with Mr. Price, decides to stick her nose where is doesn't belong, and "help" the police find the murderer. Jaffarian did her homework and has come up with a plausible picture of collectors and their obsession, The first lunchbox-as-we-know-it was one with Hopalong Cassidy on it in 1950. Her sleuth is an engaging, no longer young, definitely not slim, woman, who is afraid of commitment. I like Odelia. The big publishing houses made a mistake when they didn't grab Jaffarian's series. This is one iUniverse series worth searching for.
Reviewed by Barbara Franchi, October 2003
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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)
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