Madeira Cutler, NYC designer, comes home to assist planning her sister's wedding. At the engagement party and old girlfriend of the groom turns up dead, strangled with the bride-to-be's veil. This was an interesting mystery with the heroine on the cusp of making a career change. I found the basic story to be good, and the touches of psychometry (ability to discern something from contact with an object) when dealing with vintage clothing to be fun. However, the constant labeling of every person and event by the brand name labels associated with them was annoying, especially when it referred to everything; men's and women's clothing, accessories and even their perfumes. Just too much, dating the story, and unbelievable. ( )

Annette Blair just can't seem to get away from her paranormal roots, and I am perfectly happy with that!
I've followed Blair through many of her romance books, but this is the first in her mystery series and it is exactly what I expected from her. Fun, light, and engaging, this book hits all the marks.
When Maddie moves home to help with her sisters wedding and accidently stumbles over a corpse you would think she would high tail it back to NYC, but she doesn't. Maddie also makes a shocking discovery while trying to fit her sister into her vintage wedding dress that she sees flashes of the past from another woman wearing the exact same dress. Somehow the points connect and Maddie decides to use her new powers to find the killer since she is not happy with the speed of the local police department.
I ate this book up and quickly grabbed book 2. If you enjoy fast reads with unexpected twists that keep you guessing, this series is for you! ( )

It's been a long time since I read a fantasy novel that felt so fresh and compelling. The story was engaging and the protagonist seemed like a real person. The prose was clean and descriptive without being flowery.
I can't wait to read book 2! ( )

Once she sopps the constant name dropping and the using designer names and sewing tecniques as swear words it gets a lot better but not terrific read. A good story without the extra trash that is trying to make it fit a mold and the trying so hard not to use a curse word while still having the heroine have sex with her on and off again boyfriend is more than a little weird. If you are going to have one why not the other? ( )

A mystery, with a hint of romantism, humorous, with a touch of whimsy, ghosts and witchery
( )

Madeira, Mads for short (a N.Y. fashion designer w/ a penchant for vintage clothing) comes home to help her youngest sister who is getting married. Someone wants the bride dead....only they've killed the wrong woman. The monster-in-law to be is pretty narcissistic and is planning the wedding around the bride to be...there are skeletons in the closet and ghosts too....some of who actually talk to Madeira!

The book started off in a rather annoying manner...with a cop who has held a grudge against Mads since 3rd grade acts out in a non-professional manner, her BFFL (Best Friend For Life) has double standards when it comes to men....and we don't really get to know that Mads' mother died when she was 10 in a car accident...until more than midway through the book. Most of these things can be ignored.....

There was a good mystery, a good plot, a decent romance, and well written paranormal experiences. If you like vintage clothing and the description thereof, that'll be another thing in this book's favor.

I've the second one in the series on order....... ( )

The Book: A Veiled Deception

The Particulars: Mystery, Penguin, available in Mass Market and e-book.

Why was it in my TBR? I was in the mood for mystery

The Review:

The blurb:
The right dress can be magic; the wrong one—murder! From the national bestselling author of Sensation's Witch series comes the new Vintage Magic mystery series, featuring Madeira Cutler. While opening her own vintage clothing shop, Maddie must clear her family's name when her sister's wedding festivities hit a snag: murder.

My impressions:
I found this when I was cleaning my apartment. I wanted to read something that wasn’t fantasy or PNR. This is a cozy mystery, with a touch of paranormal. It is a story about love, present and past. And it is a wonderful tale. The story made me laugh, and say aww. And, I couldn’t put down. I think, I need to check out the rest of her books! ( )

First Line: My father would never have asked me to take a leave of absence from my job in New York City if he could have handled my sister's wedding and the "Jezebel" plotting to preempt it without me.

Madeira (Maddie) Cutler takes a leave of absence from her design job in a New York fashion house to go home to Connecticut to help with her younger sister's wedding. Sherry is looking forward to having Maddie design a spectacular wedding dress just for her, but at dinner they learn that the groom's mother has an heirloom dress and veil that she fully expects to be used. Not only that but a former girlfriend is draped all over the husband-to-be.

When the Jezebel later turns up dead, Sherry is the prime suspect, and Maddie isn't about to let something like that spoil her sister's wedding. What she knows that most other folks don't is that she's going to have a little extra help: Maddie not only can see the occasional ghost, she can touch fabrics and see things associated with the clothing's past.

This is a light, fun read-- perfect for curling up on a cold winter afternoon. I loved Maddie's fashion- and fabric-inspired way of cursing ("son of a stitch", "wooly knobby knits", etc.). It shows a lot more education and imagination than the usual profanities. I also loved the bits that dealt with design and vintage clothing.

The mystery was a bit weak; the killer seemed very obvious to me, but all the characters clucked and scratched everywhere in the barnyard but inside the hen house. Me? I was enjoying myself and more than content to watch them cluck and fuss. When I need something light and fun, I know that I'll be able to turn to this series for a pleasurable read. ( )

A Veiled Deception is the first in the cozy mystery series featuring Madeira Cutler who is a fashion designer with a love and flair for vintage clothing. But when she comes home for her youngest sister's wedding, trouble begins to brew as her sister's nemesis is found strangled with a bridal veil. Now Madeira is out to clear her sister and her family's name as well as find out who the killer really is. And while doing that she begins to discover and explore the new paranormal gifts that she inherited from her mother.

Hmm...what to say about this one other than I liked it. It wasn't great or anything but it was a fun enough read. Madeira, or Maddie as she is most often called, is an interesting main character with a lot of quirks. The way she talked at times was a bit over the top but other than that I liked her. The mystery itself was interesting and I especially liked the visions that Maddie was having of previous women wearing the same wedding dress. It was definitely a cozy mystery with nothing too over the top but a fun read nonetheless.

All in all, I would recommend this book to cozy mystery lovers who enjoy reading about fashion as well. As for myself, I'll be reading the 2nd book at some point but I won't be rushing out or anything to grab it. Good but not great :) ( )

picked up A Veiled Deception, the first of the Vintage Magic mysteries, a few weeks ago and just decided to read it the other day. Just after I finished it, I happened to be at Borders with $5 in Borders Bucks, happened upon the sequel and picked it up.

In the first book, Madeira Cutler goes back to her (fictional) home town of Mystick Falls, Connecticut to help with her sister Sherry's wedding to Justin Vancortland. At a dinner party on her first evening home, Maddie finds an ex-girlfriend of Justin's strangled with Sherry's antique veil. Of course, Sherry is the prime suspect.

As Maddie rushes to find the real killer before the wedding, she discovers some interesting intuitive attributes she didn't know she had.

While Maddie, who works for a top New York fashion designer, is in Mystick Falls, she learns that a disused mortuary building is for sale,and decides it would be a perfect home for the vintage clothing store she's always dreamed of.

The second book begins as did the first: with Maddie's arrival in Mystic Falls. Now owner of the old morgue building, she's preparing to open her store. When she drops by on the way to her father's house, she interrupts an intruder, frightening him off, although he just returns later.

The plot of Larceny and Lace is a little convoluted and there seems to be an abundance of villains. But the characters are appealing and story is engaging, and I found myself rushing to learn the conclusion.

These books are a lot of fun, and the supernatural element isn't terribly sinister. I'm looking forward to Death by Diamonds, the next book in the series (excerpted at the end of Larceny, though no publication date is given). ( )

"A Veiled Deception" is a murder mystery with 'shades' of the paranormal by Annette Blair. Fashionistas will enjoy the attention to detail and name-dropping while mystery lovers will like the heroine who always seems to put her best shoe forward.

Madeira is back home. She's returned for a visit, but mostly to design her baby sister's wedding dress. Her visit is apparently none too soon as the groom-to-be's ex has shown up and is trying to hijack the wedding...with the assistance of the groom's mother!

When the pesky ex turns up dead, Madeira vows to chase down the real killer to keep her sister off the list of suspects. And there appear to be plenty of people who would have loved to kill the victim. Between hunky copys, sexy old boyfriends, getting visions from old clothes, and trying to finally come to grips with her mother's death--Madeira certainly isn't bored.

I enjoyed reading "A Veiled Deception". I found it fun and funny if a tad shallow. If you're not a fashion hound, there will be alot of dialogue that won't 'work' for you. My own aversion to name-dropping likely also played a part in my distaste for those sections of the dialogue. Prada, Manolo, Louboutin--it's all about the shoes...and purses. There are lots of suspects, plenty of clues, but without the author's final reveal there was no way to put them all together. So even though I liked the mystery portion, I'll likely not go out of my way to read another. ( )

I found this nice, brisk mystery to be an excellent summer read. I enjoyed the characters and look forward to their deveopment as the series progresses. ( )

Maddie Cutler has always seen the ghosts in her hometown, so she is not surprised to be greeted by them in the windows of her childhood home. She has come home to help her sister, Sherry, plan her wedding and fend off a less than thrilled future mother-in-law's interference. Plans are further complicated by the recent appearance of the groom's old girlfriend who is acting more like a fiance than an old friend. When this old girlfriend turns up murdered, Maddie's psychic powers go into overdrive with the help of a vintage wedding gown.

I loved this book. It has all the chick lit touches that make it fun to read, shoes, clothes and old boyfriends. It also has a pretty decent mystery that keeps you turning the pages. What really grabbed me though was the sly humor that often made me chuckle. The other charm was the author's ability to create a feeling that these people really knew and cared for each other. A sense of home, if you will. ( )