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Professor Sally Good #1
Murder is an Art
Dr. Sally Good, Head of the English and Fine Arts Division of Hughes Community College in Texas, has her hands full. On top of dealing with numerous complaints from testy faculty members concerning the allocation of the department's budget, she must also conduct an inquiry into the recent misbehavior of the department's philandering art professor, Val Hurley, who stands accused of molesting a young female student. And then there is the complaint lodged against the art department - and namely Val - for displaying what some people see as a satanic painting. When Val is found bludgeoned to death in his office and the painting in question disappears, it isn't long before the department dissolves into a state of chaos and hysteria. Sally begins to realize that she might be in over her head when the student in question is found murdered shortly thereafter.
- GenresMystery
243 pages, Hardcover
First published April 1, 1999
About the author
Bill Crider
242 books235 followersTaught English at Howard Payne University in Brownwood, Tex., and went on to become the chair of the Division of English and Fine Arts at Alvin Community College in Alvin, Tex.; prolific writer of mystery, science fiction, western, horror, and children's books, not to mention short stories, articles, reviews, and blog posts; perhaps best known for his Sheriff Dan Rhodes mystery series.
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Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews
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March 13, 2018This hardcover of the first in the series of Sally Good novels is signed by Bill Crider.
January 31, 2016
Hughes Community College in Southeast Texas near Houston is a small college doing its best to survive. That means the school and its President Dr. Fieldstone can’t afford and don’t want any scandal. That includes possibly questionable artwork currently being exhibited on campus.
Dr. Sally Good has spent six years as head of the English and Fine Arts Division dealing with budget complaints, political bickering and gossip, and the other stuff that is the bane of academic heads everywhere. This is the first time she has been called in over artwork. Dr. Fieldstone has summoned her along with several other people to his office to deal with a complaint lodged by Roy Talon.
Talon is a local celebrity having made his considerable fortune as an automobile dealer. There is a painting of a goat being exhibited on campus as part of deal showcasing the work of students in the prison outreach program. Bad enough that the goat itself is a symbol of Satanism, according to Talon, but he believes that one can also see “666” painted on the goat head. Upon closer examination of the painting, not only do the staff members not see the sign of the beast, one goes so far to suggest if there is anything it might be “911” making it a sign to call the police.
As a taxpayer and very important person, Talon wants the painting gone. In any institution, bosses handle difficult issues by forming committees to study the problem and make recommendations. Doing so spreads the responsibility around and absolves the boss from having to upset any one group. Before long, the idea is floated to have a newly created committee review entire exhibit to consider if any of the works are Satanic and thus should be removed.
One of those involved in this mess is the chair of the art department. The same department head who may have once again been stepping out on his wife. The same department head who is soon found very much dead in the art exhibit. When the local police seem to be ignoring key pieces of evidence it is left to Dr. Sally Good to solve the crime in Murder Is An Art: A Mystery by Bill Crider.
If you have read very many of author Bill Crider’s books, you will notice that he often starts with something relatively minor that either directly or indirectly leads to a murder. This is especially true in his mysteries based in academia whether it is the Carl Burns series or this one. He also blends in some misdirection with characters that are a bit out there. There is more than one such character at work here and Dr. Good’s observations about them are very funny.
My favorite in this one was Perry “A. B. D.” Johnson who goes ballistic over just about anything on a daily basis. The “A. B. D.” nickname stands for “All But Dissertation” as he has done the entire graduate coursework and everything else required except for finishing the dissertation. Every campus has at least one. Back in my days at the University of Texas at Dallas there were at least two such people I knew of in the Literature and History Departments. Both were very strange guys. One in fact, who did lose his mind regarding a chair, so when reading the opening pages of Murder is an Art: A Mystery where A. B. D. Johnson becomes quite agitated over a chair it made this reader laugh out loud.
Laughing out loud is always a frequent danger with any work by Texas author Bill Crider. Published in 1999 the book may annoy some readers who expect the first body to fall by the third paragraph at the very latest. Instead, that will come later as the author introduces us to our fictional companions and sets the table for the mystery meal to come. First in the Dr. Sally Good series, the read is occasionally funny while taking numerous twists and turns to solve a murder or two and quite a lot more. Murder is an Art: A Mystery is a solidly good read and one very much worthy of your time.
Murder is an Art: A Mystery
Bill Crider
http://www.billcrider.com
Thomas Dunne Books (St. Martin’s Press)
http://us.macmillan.com/thomasdunne
April 1999
ISBN# 0-312-19927-9
Hardback (e-book available)
256 Pages
$21.95
Material supplied by the good folks of the Plano Public Library System.
Kevin R. Tipple ©2016
Dr. Sally Good has spent six years as head of the English and Fine Arts Division dealing with budget complaints, political bickering and gossip, and the other stuff that is the bane of academic heads everywhere. This is the first time she has been called in over artwork. Dr. Fieldstone has summoned her along with several other people to his office to deal with a complaint lodged by Roy Talon.
Talon is a local celebrity having made his considerable fortune as an automobile dealer. There is a painting of a goat being exhibited on campus as part of deal showcasing the work of students in the prison outreach program. Bad enough that the goat itself is a symbol of Satanism, according to Talon, but he believes that one can also see “666” painted on the goat head. Upon closer examination of the painting, not only do the staff members not see the sign of the beast, one goes so far to suggest if there is anything it might be “911” making it a sign to call the police.
As a taxpayer and very important person, Talon wants the painting gone. In any institution, bosses handle difficult issues by forming committees to study the problem and make recommendations. Doing so spreads the responsibility around and absolves the boss from having to upset any one group. Before long, the idea is floated to have a newly created committee review entire exhibit to consider if any of the works are Satanic and thus should be removed.
One of those involved in this mess is the chair of the art department. The same department head who may have once again been stepping out on his wife. The same department head who is soon found very much dead in the art exhibit. When the local police seem to be ignoring key pieces of evidence it is left to Dr. Sally Good to solve the crime in Murder Is An Art: A Mystery by Bill Crider.
If you have read very many of author Bill Crider’s books, you will notice that he often starts with something relatively minor that either directly or indirectly leads to a murder. This is especially true in his mysteries based in academia whether it is the Carl Burns series or this one. He also blends in some misdirection with characters that are a bit out there. There is more than one such character at work here and Dr. Good’s observations about them are very funny.
My favorite in this one was Perry “A. B. D.” Johnson who goes ballistic over just about anything on a daily basis. The “A. B. D.” nickname stands for “All But Dissertation” as he has done the entire graduate coursework and everything else required except for finishing the dissertation. Every campus has at least one. Back in my days at the University of Texas at Dallas there were at least two such people I knew of in the Literature and History Departments. Both were very strange guys. One in fact, who did lose his mind regarding a chair, so when reading the opening pages of Murder is an Art: A Mystery where A. B. D. Johnson becomes quite agitated over a chair it made this reader laugh out loud.
Laughing out loud is always a frequent danger with any work by Texas author Bill Crider. Published in 1999 the book may annoy some readers who expect the first body to fall by the third paragraph at the very latest. Instead, that will come later as the author introduces us to our fictional companions and sets the table for the mystery meal to come. First in the Dr. Sally Good series, the read is occasionally funny while taking numerous twists and turns to solve a murder or two and quite a lot more. Murder is an Art: A Mystery is a solidly good read and one very much worthy of your time.
Murder is an Art: A Mystery
Bill Crider
http://www.billcrider.com
Thomas Dunne Books (St. Martin’s Press)
http://us.macmillan.com/thomasdunne
April 1999
ISBN# 0-312-19927-9
Hardback (e-book available)
256 Pages
$21.95
Material supplied by the good folks of the Plano Public Library System.
Kevin R. Tipple ©2016
July 4, 2020
Ah, the unity and love of a college campus. There’s just nothing like it anywhere. That’s because there’s just no such place or circumstance.
Sally Good is a department chair at a small Texas community college. She has to deal with obnoxious faculty members, one of whom continues to teach despite a long-delayed completion of a dissertation. He’s the guy you meet as the book opens. He’s in complaining to Sally about a colleague who got a new chair.
Then there’s the local celebrity car dealer who is convinced that a painting in a college display on campus represents Satanic art. There’s the art faculty member who has been accused of diddling a student art model who had agreed to pose for him naked.
Things heat up for Sally when someone finds that same professor murdered. Granted, the young art model may be a suspect, but Sally thinks the death happened for different reasons
Sally Good is a department chair at a small Texas community college. She has to deal with obnoxious faculty members, one of whom continues to teach despite a long-delayed completion of a dissertation. He’s the guy you meet as the book opens. He’s in complaining to Sally about a colleague who got a new chair.
Then there’s the local celebrity car dealer who is convinced that a painting in a college display on campus represents Satanic art. There’s the art faculty member who has been accused of diddling a student art model who had agreed to pose for him naked.
Things heat up for Sally when someone finds that same professor murdered. Granted, the young art model may be a suspect, but Sally thinks the death happened for different reasons
January 12, 2025
I had thought I liked this series.
I didn’t like this one. I hate crime stories where you never get to focus properly on the actual facts because the whole story is about people suggesting ridiculous implausible theories about the crime. This was one of those. No more!
I didn’t like this one. I hate crime stories where you never get to focus properly on the actual facts because the whole story is about people suggesting ridiculous implausible theories about the crime. This was one of those. No more!
January 29, 2018
Bill Crider writes the kind of mysteries that I enjoy. My favorite of his several series is the long-running Sheriff Dan Rhodes books, but this first book in the Professor Sally Good series stays in the mold of male-written Texas mild mysteries. It is relaxing, rather than spine-tingling or mystifying, to read Crider's stories.
In this one, we find Professor Sally Good, department head of the English Department of a small Texas community college--easy for Bill Crider to write about, as he is an English professor at a small Texas community college. A colleague is murdered for reasons unclear. As we become familiar with the English Department people and those they associate with, some suspicions arise.
Professor Good follows the clues down several wrong roads, and eventually unravels the matter. Along the way she is dismissed and patronized by the campus police and local police. She'll show them!
The story ambles along pleasantly until it arrives at a reasonably logical conclusion.
This is mild praise, but if you don't need hair-raising best-seller thriller pap, this is a good story. If you do enjoy hair-raising, best-seller, spine-tingling, multiple-twists-at-the-end mystery thrillers--well, good luck with that. There are plenty of those books around. For the more mellow folks--like me--books like Bill Crider's are a little harder to find, and much more enjoyable.
In this one, we find Professor Sally Good, department head of the English Department of a small Texas community college--easy for Bill Crider to write about, as he is an English professor at a small Texas community college. A colleague is murdered for reasons unclear. As we become familiar with the English Department people and those they associate with, some suspicions arise.
Professor Good follows the clues down several wrong roads, and eventually unravels the matter. Along the way she is dismissed and patronized by the campus police and local police. She'll show them!
The story ambles along pleasantly until it arrives at a reasonably logical conclusion.
This is mild praise, but if you don't need hair-raising best-seller thriller pap, this is a good story. If you do enjoy hair-raising, best-seller, spine-tingling, multiple-twists-at-the-end mystery thrillers--well, good luck with that. There are plenty of those books around. For the more mellow folks--like me--books like Bill Crider's are a little harder to find, and much more enjoyable.
June 3, 2016
#1 in the Sally Good series. Author Crider returns to his base and writes about a small Texas college. Dr. Sally Good is the most normal character in the novel and for a protagonist we don't learn much about her. The other educators are a bunch of whack jobs in one way or another, except for the ex-con whose offence is never revealed. A minor mystery and I'll try the next in the series because I'm fond of Crider's Sheriff Rhodes series.
Dr. Sally Good is chair of the division of arts and humanities at a small college in Texas. Though bickering is normal among the professors, someone goes too far when the art department chair, Val Hurley, is found murdered in his office. Suspecting a connection with the disappearance of a controversial painting, Good grows disappointed with police efforts and decides to solve the case with the help of her colleague, Professor Jack Neville. Hurley had recently come before the college president for painting a student, Tammi Thompson, in the nude, and police fear Tammi's jealous husband may have committed the murder. Another suspect is A.B.D. Johnson, a muckraking colleague who was appalled by what he considered Val's cavalier use of school funds.
Dr. Sally Good is chair of the division of arts and humanities at a small college in Texas. Though bickering is normal among the professors, someone goes too far when the art department chair, Val Hurley, is found murdered in his office. Suspecting a connection with the disappearance of a controversial painting, Good grows disappointed with police efforts and decides to solve the case with the help of her colleague, Professor Jack Neville. Hurley had recently come before the college president for painting a student, Tammi Thompson, in the nude, and police fear Tammi's jealous husband may have committed the murder. Another suspect is A.B.D. Johnson, a muckraking colleague who was appalled by what he considered Val's cavalier use of school funds.
February 9, 2018
Funny thing, this book is NOT my style at all (I don't read American mysteries) but our library conducted a "Blind Date With a Book" program by wrapping library books in plain brown wrappers with intriguing "clues" as to what lay inside, and this was my "date!" I have to admit, like most blind dates, the build-up was better than the pay-off, but it was an intriguing concept none-the-less!
This was an easy, innocuous read, in that it was fast-paced, lighthearted and undemanding. I read it in one day, but it did fool me as far as the murderer went, so that's a win for the author. (I thought my candidate for killer was much better, though!) It wasn't great writing, but it was kind of humorous and it did have a few surprises (watch out for pistol-packin' professors!)
It made a break in my sometimes too intense reading, so thank you, Butte Co. Library for a "novel" approach to choosing a book!
This was an easy, innocuous read, in that it was fast-paced, lighthearted and undemanding. I read it in one day, but it did fool me as far as the murderer went, so that's a win for the author. (I thought my candidate for killer was much better, though!) It wasn't great writing, but it was kind of humorous and it did have a few surprises (watch out for pistol-packin' professors!)
It made a break in my sometimes too intense reading, so thank you, Butte Co. Library for a "novel" approach to choosing a book!
May 5, 2020
I'm a huge fan of Crider's Sheriff Rhodes series.
This, The first in another series, did not disappoint.
Set in a Community College outside of Houston, it is a fun read with a good mystery.
I see there were only 3 written in this series.
I will treasure and enjoy the next two.
This, The first in another series, did not disappoint.
Set in a Community College outside of Houston, it is a fun read with a good mystery.
I see there were only 3 written in this series.
I will treasure and enjoy the next two.
October 23, 2011
At a small community college outside Houston is teacher is accussed of sexual harassment of a student and is later found dead. A contraverial painting in a student exibition is missing. Then the woman making the sexaual harassment accusation is found murdered by Dr. Sally Good who decides to find the truth of the murder as she was the murdered teacher's department chair and the police were ignoring clues.
January 2, 2009
This was a quick read with a female professor as the main character
November 28, 2011
Dr. Sally Good, head of English and Fine Arts at a college deals with murder.
June 2, 2009
Thought it would be better--academic setting and a stolen painting. But I was bored with it; could be me; he gets good reviews.
Want to Read
April 8, 2010From Thrall withdraw list.
Dr. Sally Goode, head of English dept at TX college. Mystery.
Dr. Sally Goode, head of English dept at TX college. Mystery.
Read
May 11, 2011not good, it was like someone like me wrote this shaggy dog story.
Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews