MOTHER OF THE BRIDE

Pity Molly West. Not only is she giving the biggest wedding in rural Ohio’s Tricounty history—ten bridesmaids on a shoestring budget—but her daughter Amanda announces that she wants to combine her wedding to moneyed Bently Cottingham with a Civil War battle reenactment. On top of that, there’s an escaped convict—Luke Siever, who busted out of Lima, obviously headed toward the wife he put in the hospital two years ago—along with rumors that right-wing paramilitaries are smuggling serious weaponry into the normally quiet Tricounty area. The only refuge from all this madness would be the past—if Bonnie Siever, hiding from her husband in the neighborhood caves, hadn’t just found a ten-year-old skeleton. There are so many plot lines, in fact—together with so many death threats, bridesmaids, storied ancestors, Civil War anecdotes, and throwaway sociological theories courtesy of Molly’s professor husband—that you may wonder if the happy day will ever arrive, or if you’ll notice when it does. Never fear. Westfall (Fowl Play, 1996) pulls it all together, orchestrating a memorable confrontation between militiamen and re-enactors en route to a surprisingly well-clued denouement.