Mystery...in haunted, historic
Providence Rhode Island
by Donna Montalbano
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About The Shop
Fall on Wickenden Street, Fox Point, Providence, Rhode Island
The Shop on Wickenden Street is set on the historic East Side of Providence, Rhode Island. It is the stand-alone sequel to The House on Benefit Street where Angie Russo moves after the death of her husband. Shop finds Angie lonely, still dreaming of her lost life and now financially pinched: her rambling old house is a money pit that her radio station receptionist paycheck can’t possibly fill.
One winter afternoon an ill wind blows Angie, literally, through the door of Lost and Found, a shabby antique shop on Wickenden Street in Fox Point; the bohemian waterfront neighborhood in Providence where centuries ago, "triangle trade" slave ships set sail for Africa. The shop's silver haired proprietor takes a fancy to Angie and offers her a part time job. The extra money helps, but the shop on Wickenden Street is unnerving. Its walls are lined with antique mirrors and strange shadows drift like smoke across the cloudy glass. The shop itself is crammed with curiosities, tall and small...but the shapes seem to shift in the gloom. Sometimes, when Angie is alone in the shop, she hears faint music coming from she doesn't know where.
She knows the song, though.
Ray Charles singing, "You Don't Know Me."
On the bright side: Angie’s two friends, Beatrice and Marian, are getting married (to each other) and the occasion brings her son, his wife and her beloved granddaughter from Chicago to a Berkshires hotel to attend the wedding: an extravaganza only Marian could dream up and only Beatrice could pay for...
On the downside: Angie’s pal Mary Lou is on the lam with millions in marital assets and Angie’s afraid she’s gone for good.
Angie misses her dead husband Tom so much, she’s started emailing him in Heaven. She has males in her life: her tenant, a young Lebanese doctor who lives in her basement apartment; her at-work nemesis Gene James, Rhode Island’s answer to Rush Limbaugh; but the one she loves is her flirtatious golden retriever, Westerly, who never met a stranger he didn’t lick.
Things start looking up when Angie gets an unexpected promotion at WRI, but it turns out somebody at the station doesn’t want to see her get ahead…
One day, on an impulse, Angie buys a small carved mirror from the shop's inventory; lovely but of no intrinsic value. So why is her house on Benefit Street burgled, and the only object missing is this insignificant little looking glass?
Enjoy your visit to The Shop on Wickenden Street and check in every week for a new chapter!
