FIRST PAGE: A Child's Garden of Death by Richard Forrest, Pocket Books, 1977.

A Child's Garden of Death by Richard Forrest Vintage 1977 Pocket Paper – Monster Books and Items

SYNOPSIS:

It was a ghoulish discovery. Three bodies in a shallow grave on a Connecticut hillside -- a man, a woman, a child -- and a mottled and decomposed doll. It was a garden of death, planted thirty years before....

For Police Chief Rocco Herbert, solving the gruesome murders is the biggest challenge of his small-town career. For author Lyon Wentworth, finding the killer becomes an obsession.

Together, they embark on an almost hopeless search for the murderer -- and when they get too close to the truth the killer strikes at them!

PAGE 1:

"Who he hell is Sonja Henie?"

The young police officer turned from the grave. His outstretched hand held tongs which grasped the neck of the mottled and decomposed doll. In macabre unison the others in semi-circle around the pit followed his slow movements.

"Bag and label it before you drop the Goddamn thing," Chief Rocco Herbert said.

With his free hand the young officer snapped open a plastic film bag and abruptly dropped the doll inside. As the doll slid down the smooth surface a small skate crumpled into fine dust.

"You're breaking the Goddamn evidence," Rocco Herbert snapped.

"Sorry, sir," the young officer replied as he gently rolled the top of the bag shut and sealed the opening. "But Sonja Henie?"

"Yes, I would think so," Lyon Wentworth said, while still staring into the excavation at their feet. He looked up at the circle of expectant faces. "The doll seems to have on ice skates and is made of a type of molded composition used during World War II when rubber was scarce and before plastics. In the forties Sonja Henie dolls were very popular with children."

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A Child's Garden of Death by Richard Forrest Vintage 1977 Pocket Paper – Monster Books and Items