Steeplechase (Homer Kelly Mystery Series)

Strange or not, Homer and Mary are soon engaged in a steeplechase, a pursuit of the mysterious lost church.

Luckily, the reader is in on the mystery. This sequel to The Deserter: Murder at Gettysburg is set in 1868 in the town of Nashoba, Massachusetts, where the daughter of the Reverend Josiah Gideon cares for her husband, James, brutally disfigured in the last battle of the Civil War. In teh parsonage across the town gree, the Reverend Horatio Biddle fumes at what he considers to be Josiah's brazen ways, while Mrs. Biddle spies on the outcome in Josiah's backyard.

Central to the story is a gigantic tree, the Great Nashoba Chesnut. Crucially intermingled with its fate are a poem by Oliver Wendell Holmes, the story "The Three Billy Goats Gruff," and the nonsense rhymes of Mother Goose. Homer and Mary Kelly will once again delve deep into the past to unravel puzzles in the present.