A COUNTRY KIND OF DEATH

This is set in northwest Connecticut where almost everyone's a successful writer. The reader waits and waits for the only appalling character--a termagant widow who's foul to her teenage stepson--to be done in, which she finally is, only to discover that the murderer has been captioned as such from the beginning. A love story, a noisy marital spat, and two nice kids do nothing to fatten the flimsy mystery action.