The Missing Hand by Susan Van Dusen

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A stolen heirloom reveals long-buried sins among a peaceful Midwestern Jewish community in this mystery from the author of Poisoned Passover.

While running the Crestfall, Illinois, Torah study group can be rewarding, it isn’t especially eventful, until a valuable heirloom is stolen from one of the group’s members. Known as a yad—the Hebrew word for hand—it is used to keep one’s place while reading the Torah. And this particular yad happens to be encrusted with a fortune’s worth of jewels. Now the mayor’s wife, Julia Donnelly, finds herself volunteering to help find the item.

With no experience in crime detection beyond what she’s seen on TV, Julia and the Torah group leader Rabbi Fine attempt to solve the mystery and address the misery it is causing. But they soon find that the heirloom they seek holds a mystery of its own—one that reaches back to the Second World War—about the enigmatic man who brought this priceless yad to America in the first place.

Year first published: 2021