Slay Bells: A Vintage Mystery

Review\nThis is a well written holiday cozy mystery featuring a closed group of high school friends and their mentor and teacher. They plan to have a reunion after 10 years to see how they're all getting along in life. It turns out that despite their early promise, they're divorced, neurotic, angry, or even in prison. One by one they begin to die violently after a malevolent visit from Santa Claus.\nIt is a product of the time it was written, although there are some pithy observations about the unfair nature of business opportunities for women at the time and general attitudes about gender roles and rigid class differences between the "haves" and the "have nots" which will resonate with modern readers.\nThe manuscript has not been edited for modern audiences, so much of the dialogue seems somewhat stilted and retro. It fits very well with the story, but readers should remember that it's a vintage work approaching 70ish years of age.\nThe denouement and resolution were unexpected but not unsatisfying. --Annie Buchanan\nChristmas Calamities...
A short vintage mystery peppered with well drawn, if quite rightly unlikeable, cast of characters populating a fast paced plot set Christmastime. An entertaining tale which will undoubtedly appeal to aficionados of the Golden Age of Crime. Another pleasing and wholly appreciated addition.
--Ruth Giles\nThey call themselves the Big Five and a Half.\nIn the aftermath of World War II, six high school students-rich, ambitious, handsome-are groomed for ultimate success by their teacher, Mr. Northcliffe. At their farewell picnic in Mariposa, they plan to throw a splendid reunion in ten years' time on Christmas Day-to see who is the most successful of them all.\nThe day of the reunion finds the Big Five and a Half in disarray-one divorced, one in prison... and almost all of them unhappy. Life has not turned out how most of them had hoped. On Christmas morning, a mysterious man in a Santa Claus suit visits individuals in the group with a tempting treat. It turns out that the Big Five and a Half were groomed well...for ultimate death!