Patterns in the Sand

Seaside Knitters Mystery #2

by Sally Goldenbaum

The follow-up to Death by Cashmere: next in the new mystery series set in a tight-knit seaside community.

When young fiber artist Willow Adams visits Izzy Chambers's knitting studio, she's immediately embraced by the Seaside knitters, and they see the monthly arts event at Canary Cove as a perfect place to showcase Willow's work. But the idyllic summer in Sea Harbor turns somber when the body of Nick Peabody-owner of a popular gallery-is found in a community garden. Soon all Nick's secrets begin to surface, and the residents of Sea Harbor realize they didn't know him at all. And when Nick's will reveals that his entire estate has been left to Willow, the knitters find that Willow has some dark secrets of her own...

Genres: Mystery, Knitting, Cozy Mystery, Fiction, Cozy, Crafts, Crime

304 pages, Hardcover

First published April 28, 2009

About the author

Sally Goldenbaum is a philosophy teacher, knitter, editor, and the author of more than two-dozen novels.

Series:
* A Seaside Knitters Mystery
*

Reviews

[Sandra Holladay · Rating 2 out of 5]

I really enjoy cozies and love a good book that is over way too soon. This wasn’t one of them – it’s an ok read, but it seemed I’d never finish it. Some pros: a couple of the characters really stand out (Birdie and Cass), there were a couple of knitting terms I wasn’t familiar with so looked them up. Cons: someone should have proofread the book for editing errors (can’t list them because I didn’t keep track, but they were quite obvious at the time), twice the author referred to fibers being ‘woven’ into yarn when they are actually ‘spun’ (cloth is woven), these people sure ate good and the story at times seemed more about the food than anything else – it even overshadowed the knitting aspects, I kept getting lost with all the characters (they weren’t developed enough to remember them or for me to care enough about them).

I’ll keep the rest of the books in the series on the ‘back burner’ in case I decide to give the series another try, but for now I will be trying other authors.

[Martha · Rating 1 out of 5]

I hated this book. I read “Death by Cashmere” because I love knitting, I love Cape Ann, and I love mysteries. I didn’t love that book, but I got “Patterns in the Sand” because of the above reasons and because once I start a series, I want to finish it.

I think maybe “cozies,” a term I learned from reading the reviews here, just aren’t for me. The characters spend an inordinate amount of time discussing how “scrumptious” yarn is and experiencing paroxysms of joy when a new shipment comes in. I’ve never met someone who behaves like this.

I found the details the writer has chosen to include off-putting. The yarn, to begin with, but at irrelevant moments, people’s clothes or interior décor are described in detail. And this was more in the last book than this one, but why are all the ingredients in the food listed? Yet there are seemingly dozens of characters I can’t keep track of because I don’t know much about them.

I could never get past the fact that Willow breaks into the yarn shop and hunkers down for a nap in the display window rather than one of the couches or chairs that are present and none of the main characters seems to think she’s a weirdo because of it. I get that it’s a trusting group of people, but really this is not a normal response.

This book failed to get me interested in the murder. I will not be continuing the series.

[Susan · Rating 2 out of 5]

I agree with another viewer who stated that there was more interaction with the characters getting together to eat dinner with each other and the descriptions of cooking than on the mystery itself. This is a book series that you really have to read from the beginning in order to know who everyone is. The character Nell can get a bit much as times, for me. She just seems to find her life in everyone else and a small interest in knitting. I like Izzy way better. I read the first one, but quite a bit of time went by before my interest was high enough to read this book. On the plus side,the harbor town they live is very well drawn and does make you want to live there.

[Hilary (A Wytch's Book Review) · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love the start of this book, with Willow breaking in to Izzy's shop and then the next door deli owner thinking there is a corpse! (luckily he is wrong on that count), we then have a gentle time until Aidan drops down dead, poisoned and Willow seems to be suspect #1, which the seaside knitters are really not sure about, then there is another homicide and Willow is out of the frame for THAT one - but the clues just don't add up, so the seaside knitters decide to do some snooping, and discover that not everything is sweetness and light in Sea Harbor.

[Kathleen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Stumbled on this series and find, with this second book, I simply enjoy the characters, the location and the mystery - very likeable and easy, pleasant read, that features knitting and makes my heart smile and look forward to picking up my needles.

[Shelby · Rating 4 out of 5]

I do enjoy this group of women and their knitting. Of course all the amateur sleuthing is fun too. I like the sense of community, it's all very Cabot Cove and everyone knows everyone with delicious seafood and of course the knitting. I'll definitely have to try the hat pattern found in this one. I've knitted plenty of beanies before and it should be within my abilities. ;)

I feel like this was a stronger book than the first. The mystery wasn't quite as obvious, there were multiple facets to this one. But Nell was determined, she just knew that there was something off somewhere. I felt for Willow as she's just arrived in town trying to connect with the father she never knew only for murder to upset everything with herself as the prime suspect. But Nell, Izzy and their knitting ladies were wonderful about taking her under their wing and forming a strong bond with her. She may not have gotten exactly what she thought she would in town, but Willow did find a home for herself.

This is a great easy reading cozy mystery series that I'm sure I'll be continuing with soon.

[Mary · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have visited Sea Harbor, Maine again in this second book of the Seaside Knitters Mystery. Only this time there were 2 murders and it turned out to be one of the people living in Canary Cove! Unheard of!
I found that this book was much better than the first and now I'm looking forward to the next one in this series. It is a good summer beach read, fast moving and just plain good stuff.

Sally Goldenbaum has other series that she has written. I started last night "Murders on Elderberry Road" A story about the Quiltters Club in Kansas. I was able to get to chapter 3 before my eyes closed and I don't remember any more. She is a good writer and I am enjoying spending time with the nice people that she has invented. Look for Sally's books for a beach novel to read on a nice summer day.

[Ashley · Rating 2 out of 5]

Hmm...I'm not entirely sure why I keep reading these books. The writing is okay, and the editing (both for knitting content correctness and basic English grammar) is terrible (FYI, "led" and "lead" are not the same word), but the stories are cute. The same comments I made about the first book regarding food, extra characters, etc., hold true for this book as well. I'll probably read the third because I already have it, but I don't think I'll buy any more.

[Jenn · Rating 2 out of 5]

Knitting fiction and mystery has sprung up all over the place lately. All I have to do is see that knitting is involved and I'll pick up the book to read it.

This one had a fairly captive plot but overall it didn't hold my interest well. The characters didn't seem to come life as in other books. The mystery itself had a nice little twist.

[Tessa · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars. This cozy mystery took me forever to read because I just I wasn't all that excited to get into it. It would work better as an audiobook to pass the time, but I couldn't find it available that way. I got the first and second book in this series at a Provo Library sale, and am finally reading the sequel 3 years later haha. I knew it would be just fine and then I would bring the book to a little free library once I was done. It's not bad or anything, just nothing special in particular.

The town they live in, Sea Harbor, is such a good setting and reading the book makes you want to go there. I loved reading about the art galleries and wished I could see the art. The food they eat is always so fancy and sounds good. It's not all that old (2009) but it does feel dated. I noticed that the women that didn't make good choices were described in a way that made them sound looked down on in a "bless her heart" type way (like kinda disguised by sweetness, but you know they don't think well of them). But the men were more easily forgiven for making sometimes big mistakes, like not being faithful to their partners.

[Linda Smatzny · Rating 4 out of 5]

This time the ladies in the group of friends and knitters have found a new friend, Willow Adams who has recently arrived in town. She is young and full of secrets but when she is a suspect in the murder of an artist the group rallies around. One of Willow's secrets is that she is the daughter of the artist who was murdered. The police discover that she will inherit everything from the artist which moves to the top of the suspect list according to the police. Nell who wants to help Willow enlists her fellow knitters to help Willow. The book was a quick easy read.

[Linda C · Rating 3 out of 5]

Izzy finds a young woman asleep in her yarn shop after hours and her Aunt Nell offers her a bed for the night. It turns out she's a fiber artist whom Izzy had emailed the year before about do a class at her shop when she was in the area. When a few days later a prominent local gallery owner is murdered and the young woman is left everything in his will, Nell realizes there is more to her story. The small group of knitters try to figure out who the murderer is in order to clear Willow. Not a lot of surprises in the plot. OK mystery.

[Leah · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked the New England beach town setting. I also liked the food and cooking, the knitting, and the friendships. The mystery was okay. I thought this would have been a better story without it, but I was surprised by who the guilty person was.

[Dosha (Bluestocking7) Beard · Rating 5 out of 5]

This series is getting better and better. I am getting to know the characters and that always helps a story along. Some characters are more likeable than others but for the most part, non of them get on my nerves enough for me to stop the series.

[Linda · Rating 2 out of 5]

This one was loaned by a friend, and I read it on vacation after my Kindle broke. I won't be reading any others in the series. It was a tedious read, but I finished it. Typos throughout were annoying, as were misuse of "lead" for "led" and other grammatical errors. The first victim's name is Aidan, not Nick, as stated in the blurb here.
I love knitting, and I love mystery novels, but this one was just too contrived. The characters were sympathetic but not developed enough for me to care what happened to them. There was some good writing, but overall I'm going to pass on this author. Too many other good books out there, so little time for them all.

[Ivy · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wish I could give this book 2.5 stars, because it was better than 2 stars, but not worthy of 3. I just never found myself getting attached to the characters. Perhaps the issue is that it was a second in a series, but usually with this kind of cozy mystery you don't necessarily need to read them in order. I won't be perusing any others in this series. It was fine, but not really anything to write home about.

[Carol · Rating 1 out of 5]

I lost interest and stopped reading about a third of the way through. I'm not entirely sure why, but I had some trouble keeping all the artist/shop owner characters straight in my head. And it seemed like much of the "action" took the form of conversations at social gatherings. The plot and characters just didn't pull me in enough to keep going.

[Zoe · Rating 2 out of 5]

After a promising debut (i.e. better than Maggie Sefton) this second in the series shows it's flaws. The mystery isn't bad, and there is plenty of fiber talk, but with so many characters, it's hard not to notice when every single person speaks the same way. No characterization whatsoever, and while some would argue that is okay for a cozy, I'm not one of them.

[Margaret McCamant · Rating 2 out of 5]

A quick read, one of many (often mystery) novels about groups of knitters. I often feel, as I did here, that knitting is not central to the story. The story is not about the bond among knitters if all they do is pull out their knitting at any free moment or, worse, fondle the yarn as they walk through the store.

[Lisa · Rating 2 out of 5]

The mystery part of the book was better than average, but the rest of it was so boring that I really didn't care.

[Melissa · Rating 1 out of 5]

To be fair I actually only got through half of this book before I gave up and realized life is too short to waste time on books you don't really like.

[Melissa · Rating 2 out of 5]

Sometimes a cozy mystery is what you need to make you feel, well, cozy. I really enjoy the ones that are based on food, crafts, etc. Unfortunately, I did not like this one as much as the first, and even that one I've had trouble really connecting or relating to all the characters.

For this one, the plot just felt a little too out there at times for me. While I was able to half-guess the mystery, the other part I felt didn't really have enough clues to make that kind of leap of logic. I also wasn't thrilled with the motivations and it just made me feel kind of off as to the implications of why that particular person would do that particular thing. I wish I could say more, but I'd be giving it away then. Suffice to say, their motivations were driven out of an aspect of their person that wasn't a choice and it seemed like that was considered enough reason to be the bad guy with corresponding motivation. Maybe I'm reading too much into it though.

The main characters are ok. I still don't really feel connected to them though. We cycle through so many so fast we don't have enough time to get connected perhaps. I will say that food seems to feature just as predominant as the knitting aspects in this (although why oh why are there just knitting patterns and not recipes at the end as a result??!!). I actually enjoy the food descriptions. While I don't have access to a lot of fresh seafood myself being landlocked, I at least enjoy hearing about others enjoy it.

I'll probably give the series another try, just because I do feel like there's potential here. I just can't say I'm as engaged as I'd like to be.

Review by M. Reynard 2021

[Nolan · Rating 2 out of 5]

Willow Adams drifts into the town of Sea Harbor because several months earlier, some of its residence had expressed appreciation to her in an email regarding her fiber art. She’s petite and in her early 20s. She literally breaks into Izzy Chambers’s knitting studio and falls asleep in the display window surrounded by yarn and Izzy’s cat.

The Seaside Knitters eagerly adopt her as their newest member. But when a popular art gallery owner is murdered, and when Willow is named the recipient of the gallery in his will, the knitters place all that love and acceptance stuff on something close to hold while they work through their suspicions. Soon, someone murders another town resident, and they can’t pin it on the newly dead guy’s wife, since she has a solid alibi.

This mystery seemed to plod along in a lot of places, and the writing style enhanced my propensity to fall asleep while listening. I did a lot of tracking and backtracking, and I’m not sure it was worth it. The book centers around an art gallery and art, which is a topic that consistently bores me to something close to a comatose state.

I never got close enough to these characters to try to keep them straight. I found some of the dialogue sometimes out of place, and the author spends too many instances of both showing me something and telling me the same thing. Do one or the other, will you? Preferably, show it to me. It almost felt like this group of women spent more time with the wine bottle than their knitting needles. It’s unlikely that I’ll continue reading the series.

[Nicole · Rating 3 out of 5]

Willow shows up in Sea Harbor after hours on a Friday and lets herself into Izzy's knitting shop. She has come to find her father, who turns out to be Aidan Peabody a local woodcarver. He is found dead on Sunday evening in the gardens outside of his gallery. Now she is the number one suspect. Billy Sobel is local as well and he is found dead/drowned a week later at the end of a dilapidated dock after a horrible rain storm. Who killed these men? Billy is newly married, was it his new wife? Turns out it was one of their own, Ellen, the co owner of the Glass Shop, her partner in business and in marriage was unaware that Ellen embezzled money from the artists foundation to pay for their house and studio. She got in over her head, and when Aidan found out, she poisoned him. Then she borrowed money from Billy and when she realized that his will stated any loaned money would not have to be paid to his estate, she offed him too. A cozy mystery even though there is always a murder, so weird to be called cozy. :)

[Caroline · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm not trying to make a yarn pun when I call this 'fluff.' It's fluff, but pleasant fluff.
This one was better plotted than the first one - I kind of fingered the correct murderer in advance, but a red herring led me away from the correct reason, and I didn't expect a little side twist about paintings. The characters were a little more complex.
PS: If the cat likes a person, it's totally a tell.
I have to say, though, after two books I'm getting annoyed by the occasional weird choice of word (these examples are from the first book): fear "resided" - no, it's either receded or subsided; a battered table top is not "gauged" but "gouged." And worst of all in mysteries ostensibly for and about knitters, yarn is spun, not "woven." In both books she refers to the wonderful way a particularly luscious yarn is "woven." Please, just no.
I'm waiting for fluff #3 to come in at the library so I can read them in order.

[Jennie Seaman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Again, I'm confused by the description. But luckily I didn't read it before reading the book.

When 2 members of the local artist community are found dead, can the Seaside Knitters find out who did it?

I really liked the addition of Willow in this book. I found her a really sweet character. I like all of the Seaside Knitters and I love seeing more of them in each book. There were still a lot of characters in this book and it was a little hard to keep track. I'm hoping as I continue this series, I'll get to know the town and characters enough to not be confused. I was completely surprised by the ending of this book. I totally thought it was going one way, but it ended up going somewhere completely different. I liked that surprise. I am confused why the character names in the description don't match the character names in the book.

[Paula Ratcliffe · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book follows newest person to show up at Canary Cove Willow Adams. Willow Adams winds up sleeping at Izzy's studio. When the women find her they are determined to help her and really wonder why she is there. When Aiden a gallery owner dies the assumption is made that Willow killed Aiden. Did Willow kill him or did someone else and why?

Nell, Izzy, Ben and everyone else in town has their work cut out for them trying to figure out who killed Aiden and why?

I enjoy this serious thoroughly. It's such great fun to go back and see what everyone is up to and this one didn't disappoint. l would love to be a friend to spend Friday nights at Nell's and see what everyone has been up to or to solve the latest mystery! Can't wait to see what is next for the Seaside Knitters!

[Angie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’ve been enjoying this cozy mystery series. In the first book, we learn about the town and the characters that become the Seaside Knitting group, that gather together and try to solve a mystery. In this book we actually see the group becoming more cohesive as they try and solve the murder of a friend in town.
The characters seem real, yet we know one character Ben, who is a wife of the knitters, who seems to be a high profile person in town that the police actually discuss the case with him. There is a lot of food around discussing the case, however this brings a sense of community, and is likely a normal occurrence in some small towns.
The characters are well developed and I reading the antics the group gets into. Looking forward to the best book.

[Alex · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked this book more than the first. It did have some of the same problems of the characters re-hashing the same "who done it" ideas, but not nearly as obnoxiously as in the first book. What I continue to think is interesting is that based on the book jackets, the story seems to have to do with Izzy and her knitting shop. However, all the Seaside Knitters books are told in the first person by Nell, Izzy's aunt. She is a perfectly good character, I just don't know why all the plot descriptions seem to make her seem like a secondary character. While I do not enjoy this series quite as much as the Kelly Flynn knitting mysteries by Maggie Sefton, they are a suitable cozy escapist read, and I plan on reading the rest of the books in this series.

[T K Nelson · Rating 3 out of 5]

The core members of the knitting group continue to make this series worthwhile. Their personalities are realistic and all seem like they would be nice to have as a friend. Continuing secondary characters including the main character, Nell’s, husband continue to actually add to the storyline rather than just take up space as in so many cozies.

This story has several mysteries woven together. Some, even though alluded to throughout the book, seem to be ignored by the sleuthing knitters for way longer than likely.

I rated 3 stars instead of 4 because I had a couple of the twists figured out very early on. Not the specific whodunnit but definitely the why forgery, embezzlement and secret lesbian relationship