Mama Rocks the Empty Cradle

Two things Mama knows: sweet-potato pie...and murder.

Old bones and buried secrets...

I would have thought a bunion operation might slow Mama down, but I should have known better. We found ourselves knee-deep in somebody else's trouble even before the surgery, when we saw crazy old Miss Birdie at the grocery store with a baby that didn't belong to her. It wasn't twenty-four hours later that the baby's mother, a young woman with a wild reputation, was murdered-and the baby had vanished.

And when my Daddy's wandering dog began bringing home old bones of the most shocking kind, no way Mama wasn't going to start snooping-with me doing her legwork. It's a good thing I still had two good feet, because before long, I was running for my life...as babies' cries and women's tears mingled in a crime fueled by motives as ancient as human memory-greed, jealousy, and old-fashioned revenge.