4 out of 5

Directed by: Martin Wood

Aurora (Candace Cameron Bure) inadvertently gets involved in another murder mystery which fortunately takes advantage of her voracious real-crime knowledge as a librarian and Mystery Club member.  Her favorite author is in town to teach and is cute and gets involved in the mystery too.  Woop woop.

It’s a simple summary, and indeed, plays out as you’d expect, being Hallmark and based on a Charlaine Harris novel, whose writing I’m apparently criticizing without ever having read or watched True Blood.  (…I shrug.)  But: as noted in the review for the first filmed adaptation, there’s again extra sparkle to this production – from casting, with everyone bringing life and fullness to their characters; to the script, which follows a predictable path but never lazily, always offering logical but interesting flows and undumb dialogue; to the production, which makes Aurora’s town feel real.  I like ‘Rora’s frustrated relationship with the police, who are allowed to investigate capably and do actually listen – grudgingly, but nonetheless – when Teargarden has real info to offer, and even the meet-cute between our lead and her author is well handled, feeling natural (within the context of all-is-well Hallmark) and supportive of the story.  And once again, director Martin Wood has a sharp eye for pacing and framing and keeping all of his actors in ensemble scenes involved in a way that avoids the static talking heads of most TV movies.

Real Murders edges out Bone to Pick for feeling a little less sensational, even though the body count is higher, but they’re both a lot of fun for the casual-mystery TV viewer.  I hope Hallmark continues to pop these out.