April 2005

Welcome to Spring! Here in the Morgue, of course, a season's a season, and they're all cold, but the reading material is hotter than ever! (What did you expect, poetry?)

This month, you'll find a revealing "How I Write" essay by Nancy Means Wright, author of the current Mad Cow Nightmare, as well as an interview with Reed Farrel Coleman, whose Moe Praeger series continues with the current The James Deans.

There are, of course, book reviews, including a review of Reed's book, and titles from Rhys Bowen, Ruth Rendell, Chester Campbell and Carole B. Schmurak, among others. You'll find some titles you'll want to add to that pile next to the bed.

And "Murder By Committee" makes a triumphant comeback (we took March off) as Gordon Aalborg, author of The Specialist, takes the story and really twists it into a pretzel! If you haven't been keeping up, you can certainly check out all 12 chapters and get yourself involved in a twisty tale that never fails to explode expectations.

So don't let those April showers get you down—stay inside, watch the flowers grow through the window, and check out the Morgue! There's plenty here to keep you inside all month.

In this month's issue:

How I Write, by Nancy Means Wright
The Mystery Morgue Interview: Reed Farrel Coleman

Reviews:

The Stalker by Al Blanchard
In Like Flynn by Rhys Bowen
Deadly Illusions by Chester D. Campbell
The James Deans by Reed Farrel Coleman
Like A Watered Garden by Patti Hill
Blood Of The Lamb by Michael Lister
The Rottweiler by Ruth Rendell
The Sapphire Sea by John B. Robinson
Deadmistress by Carole B. Shmurak

Ongoing Story:
"Murder By Committee," Chapter 12, by Gordon Aalborg

Link to Archives

 

How I Write
by Nancy Means Wright

Whether inspired by a situation, place, or social issue, the plots in my novels inevitably stem from a flaw in one or more of the characters. Mercurial farmwoman Glenna Flint in Harvest of Bones, my second Ruth Willmarth mystery, is modeled after a great-aunt whose husband of five stormy years disappeared—and family legend says she did him in. She never told! But out of this character and her "secret" and her quick temper, came the plot: years later Glenna's rented greyhound digs up a hole to reveal a skeleton—her husband, Mac, full of pitchfork holes. And everyone, including Glenna, thinks she did it.

So there I had the germ of a plot and my main character (other than my dairy farmer sleuth). I often milk family and friends, but make a collage creation, taking parts of one person, and another, throwing in myself and memory—exaggerating certain behavior, giving each character a distinctive voice. I make changes, so that in the end the facts are all lies, but the characters, hopefully, ring true.

But all I had in mind as I sat down to write that novel was Glenna's temper and failing memory, and the death of her estranged husband-nothing more. Many writers construct an elaborate outline before they start—I just can't. Asked by St. Martin's Press to do an outline for my fourth mystery, Stolen Honey, I had to write the whole book—in order to write the outline.

So I just plunged in. For Harvest of Bones I didn't know who killed Mac until the end-and then it turned out that four people were involved! And as I developed the character of the most obvious killer in Stolen Honey, I realized that he could not possibly have killed. So with that book I had to go back and turn one of my red herrings into the strangler.

For me, then, writing a novel is a voyage of discovery. I rarely know what the novel is about until I'm at least two-thirds through. I discover theme and plot as I work through the process. I try to stay open and ignorant, run behind my characters and hope I can catch up with them. But of course I can never wholly lose control, or the characters might wheel about and strangle me!

Anyway, I'd miss those surprises if I planned ahead! I might not even want to finish the book. What a bore to know what happens in advance.

 

The Mystery Morgue Interview: Reed Farrel Coleman

Reed Farrel Coleman grew up in Brooklyn, and in many ways, he never left. Now, as the author of the Moe Praeger series, he returns to his roots geographically and stylistically, touching on the books that first sparked his interest. In this interview, he discusses his preferences in reading, what being from Brooklyn means, and how poetry training has led to a hardboiled mystery series.

Did the area where you grew up influence your present outlook or interests?

That is a deceivingly difficult question. In spite of the fact that even a cursory look at my work would reveal how intensely I'm tied to my upbringing in Brooklyn, explaining it would be nearly impossible. And at what point can you separate time and place from family, family from religion, religion from friends, from enemies? The romance of my childhood, as difficult as it was, is so much more than the sum of its parts. My childhood was full of contradictions. I was reared in a secular Jewish household where my parents spoke fluent Yiddish. Though raised in Brooklyn, it was not the urban, treeless Brooklyn I suspect most people think of when they hear mention of the borough. I grew up in the Brighton Beach/Sheepshead Bay/Coney Island area, not a mile away from endless beaches and the boardwalk and the decay of what had once been the world's playground. The rusted and impotent rides of Coney Island are a central metaphor in my work. Of course, Coney Island has been revitalized. But the world I inhabit, the Brooklyn in my writing, is the Brooklyn of my head and heart, a place of endless stickball games, fireworks and tragedy. For me, it's a state of mind. I know, sounds like the Twilight Zone. Maybe it was.

As to your educational background, have you taken any formal writing courses, participated in any writers' conferences and workshops?

The only formal writing courses I have ever taken were for poetry. When I attended Brooklyn College in the mid 70s, I studied poetry under David Lehman. He was the first person to give me license to really think of myself as a writer, not someone who played at it. Also, his teaching has helped me with my prose more than I would have ever suspected, more than he could have expected. Out of boredom, I took another poetry class at the New School in Manhattan. The teacher wasn't great, but I met my wife in that class. I bet she wishes she'd taken conversational French instead. As to writers' conferences and workshops... I've never attended anything that you would strictly call a writers workshop. I mean, I've done panels at Bouchercon, etc., but nothing formal. The idea of workshops gives me a rash. I think workshops are only useful if the other participants are more skilled, better published, and more articulate than yourself. I find that very little is accomplished if the people in the room are all at the same level in their careers. To make a sports analogy: you'll only improve by playing with athletes better and more experienced than yourself. I think formal classes and/or writing groups are a better idea than workshops. Now that I've pissed everyone off...

How/when did you become interested in mysteries?

Even though my current series is called the Moe Prager Mysteries, I sort of reject that word "Mysteries." I prefer crime fiction or detective fiction. It's weird, but I never actually read crime or detective fiction when I was younger. I thought of those books as the cheesy paperbacks my dad kept on his nightstand. Boy, I got my comeuppance! What the hell do poets know, anyway? Basically, around the time I was first married, in the mid-80s, I was working in a career I hated and was looking for a way to reinvigorate my intellect. I was thinking of going back to school full time and took a class at Brooklyn College on detective fiction. Bang! The first four books we read were, in order, The Continental Op, Farewell, My Lovely, The Maltese Falcon, and The Big Sleep. I recognized the poetry in the work and thought I could like doing this. I was right.

What did you try writing before your first novel?

Poetry, plain and simple. As far back as 7th grade, I was interested in poetry. My English teacher, Mr. Isaacs, busy evading the draft through choice of career, took an unconventional approach to introducing poetry to us. He used song lyrics, e.e. cummings' poems, the kind of stuff that would appeal to kids instead of the usual stuff. There was also this girl in school named Mary Censor who was wicked good at poetry. And if you read my second Moe Prager book, Redemption Street, you can see that her life came to a tragic end. In any case, by the time I was fifteen I had started writing poetry. It was typically goofy, sentimental and overwritten—sounds like my first novel. Well, I wrote a lot of it and got worked through some of my faults. "Monopoly" was published in my high school literary magazine at the end of my sophomore year and I was editor in chief as a senior. I continued to write, edit, and publish throughout college and into my 40s. I was editor of a small and shockingly profitable poetry journal called Poetry Bone up until a few years ago. My work has appeared in Proteus, The Long Island Quarterly, The Chiron Review, The Cincinnati Poets' Collective and other journals. If you'd like to read a sample, go to my website: www.reedcoleman.com. I have also been preparing a pitch for a book featuring the published poetry of crime fiction writers. To date I've collected works from Ken Bruen, Maggie Estep, Ralph Pezzullo and others. I'm still looking.

What did you learn from writing The James Deans?

I think I learned that an author can make some commercial choices while continuing to maintain his or her integrity. Any look at my previous work will tell you I'm a title freak. Yet I knew this book had to have a title which pleased my publishing house, my readership and myself. I also chose a skeleton of a plot which had a natural hook. I could have gone several ways with the plot, but this time took the road most traveled. I also learned what I learn every time I write. I get better at my craft and learn to love the physical act of writing even more. Then there is the surprising aspect of the characters teaching me more about who and what they really are.

How long did it take you to write?

Four months. I'm quick.

Does your living and having lived in Brooklyn play any part in your writing?

Alas, I no longer live in Brooklyn. But separation only enhances the romance of Brooklyn for me. I mean romance in the way the Romantic poets would have meant it; the long ago and the far away. Moe Prager gets to experience in his reality my romance with Brooklyn.

Have you traveled? If so, has it contributed to the content of your book?

Yes, I have traveled. My first "real" career was in the air freight business. It entailed a lot of travel throughout the U.S. and Europe. And now with touring my books, I've expanded. I've just returned from Arizona and California and I'm heading into Texas and Florida next. The second part of the question is trickier. It would seem that it hasn't really contributed to my work in an obvious way. However, travel cannot help but grow you. Hence, in so much that travel has changed me, it has added to my work. I think it helps with perspective.

How do you do your research?

I don't! I hate research something bad. I think that's why I don't write procedurals. For me, writing is all about characters. And all I need for that is my gut. Please, no fat jokes. If I have a particular question, I ask cop buddies, other writers, or go to the Internet. Then there's faking it..

Where did you get the idea for The James Deans?

Although readers might suspect it's a story ripped from the headlines, I actually grafted a story I had thought of years ago onto current events. Plus, the payoff crime is the one more grounded in reality. It goes back to an old Long Island murder case from the early 80s.

When you create a character, how much of that character comes from your personal experience? Are your characters just an extension of your own life and are their experiences from your own life, or are they completely fictional?

Oy, such a question! I know you've heard this before, but I don't create characters. Characters create themselves. To create themselves, they draw on the only resource available to them: me.

No character, either on the pages of a book or in the real world is completely fictional or actual. In some ways, we present fictionalized versions of ourselves to the world, even to ourselves. Why I think my characters are so alive is because I never forget that even fictional characters have inner selves and a fantasy life.

 

Reviews

The Stalker and Other Tales of Love and Murder
by Al Blanchard
Koenisha Publications
Hardcover, 283 pages, $19.95
ISBN: 0974168599
Reviewed by Kathy Thomason

Welcome to the mysterious and bizarre worlds created by Al Blanchard, a world in which a man sets out to find who killed his boss, not because he thinks the police are incompetent but because he fears that they will discover he has been embezzling and will suspect him.

Or the world of a mind reader who becomes convinced that the ocean liner he is on is doomed, with an expected twist. Or find out what happens when the mafia opens up a weight loss clinic and in another when a young woman finds out that her date is a hit man. And find out what happens when a retired con, against his better judgment, decides to do just one more job and two young men follow up on what they believe to be their father's last wishes and dig up the town's wealthiest man. A woman who runs the most successful nursery in town shares with the readers her secret fertilizer and a man finds himself in jail for killing a man who is very much alive.

Blanchard uses all the considerable skills demonstrated in his previous works to surprise, humor and befuddle us in the twenty-five stories in this collection. With twisted logic, intricate plot twists and endings that you wouldn't have expected, this is a collection you will want to curl up with and devour in one sitting.

 

In Like Flynn
by Rhys Bowen
St. Martin's Press
Hardcover, 336 pages $23.95
ISBN: 031232815X
Reviewed by Barbara F. Thompson

Private investigator Molly Murphy goes undercover posing as the cousin of wealthy Senator Barney Flynn at his mansion, Adora. Located on the remote side of the Hudson River, Molly's assignment surprisingly comes from New York City police Captain Daniel Sullivan. Sent to Adora on the pretext of spying on the Sorensen Sisters (currently guests at Adora), Daniel actually wants Molly out of New York for two reasons: to escape the horrible typhoid epidemic which grips the city and for her own safekeeping after Molly fingers a notorious gangster she caught stealing a wallet. Molly and Daniel's on again, off again romance plus his aversion to Molly being tied up in murder investigations has Molly bewildered about the assignment. However, with her dwindling bank balance and lack of clients, she agrees to take on the assignment.

New York authorities have been trying to convict the Sorensen Sisters of fraud but have as yet been unable to present evidence that they are not the spiritualists they claim to be. Senator Flynn and his wife Theresa lost their two-year-old son five years ago to an unsolved kidnapping. Now Theresa, an invalid since the kidnapping, has invited the sisters to their house in order to make contact with her dead son.

Instead of concerning herself with the Sorensen Sisters, Molly becomes involved in solving the true story behind the kidnapping, thus putting herself in danger despite Daniel's efforts to the contrary. To add to Molly's growing problems is the appearance of a former advisory who threatens to blow Molly's cover.

In Like Flynn is the fourth book in Bowen's Molly Murphy Mystery Series, which has already won several awards including the Agatha Award and The Anthony Award. Set in 1920's New York, Bowen brings readers the flavor and excitement of the time period through the eyes of Irish Immigrant Molly Murphy.

 

Deadly Illusions
By Chester D. Campbell
Durban House
Trade paperback, 261 pages, $12.95
ISBN: 1930754655
Reviewed by Kevin R. Tipple

Greg and Jill are making things official by opening their own private detective agency, McKenzie Investigations, in this third book in the series. While their office in a strip shopping center on the east side of Nashville, Tennessee is modest, it suits their purposes fine. It is there where they meet a walk in client by the name of Molly Saint.

Molly has a problem with her husband, Damon Saint: she does not really know the man even after several years of marriage. He never told her much about his past beyond the fact that he was a Vietnam vet and that he claimed to have done some sort of covert operations on behalf of the Government. He belongs to a shadowy group he claims are also vets, who occasionally need his help. While there were a lot of things Molly doesn't know about him, or why he forbids her to go into the basement of their home for any reason, what concerns her now is that his behavior has changed in recent weeks. While nothing has actually happened, she feels threatened by him. Greg does not really feel anything is going on but since Jill is concerned, they take the case.

Molly soon vanishes and as the McKenzies dig into Damon Saint's background while they look for her, it begins to look like she was right and her disappearance might have been foul play. At the same time, they are working a case of financial fraud at a local restaurant and Greg might have figured out who fired the fatal shot that took down the Federal Reserve Chairman at a local hotel. In short, the McKenzies have their hands full before Damon begins to get seriously annoyed with their snooping.

Picking up a short period after the very enjoyable Designed To Kill, this book continues the author's track record of strong writing, realistic characters and complex mysteries that makes this series so good. Greg and Jill are a very realistic pair, especially to those readers who have been married quite a few years. The mysteries are always complex and twisting, and this one is no exception.

While this novel could be read as a stand alone, due to the frequent allusions and explanations of the earlier books in the series, it would be best to read them in order. Therefore, start with Secret Of The Scroll, which introduces the McKenzies and follow it with Designed to Kill, which will lead you right up to this novel. Either way, enjoy these, as this is one author a reader can count on.

 

The James Deans: A Moe Prager Mystery
by Reed Farrel Coleman
Plume
Paperback, 288 pages, $13
ISBN: 0452286506
Reviewed by Francesca Terry

An ex-cop turned successful wine merchant and sometime PI. A golden-haired politico wanting to be another "comeback kid." An office intern who turned out to be a deadly researcher. These are the intriguing main characters in Reed Farrel Coleman's third Moe Prager mystery, The James Deans.

If you've got politicians in a story, then you know what the other elements will be—greed, betrayal, misuse of power, dishonesty, and in the wake of Monicagate and Gary Condit/Chandra Levy, sexual dallying will play a big part too.

Or will it? That's what's so intriguing about this specific mystery and the skill that author Reed Farrel Coleman brings to his stories—you think it's going to follow the path lead by headlines, then it veers off into uncharted territory, with roots laid deep and long ago.

Moe, a religious Jewish man, and his wife are recovering from a soul-deadening tragedy—her recent miscarriage. They attend the fancy wedding of young woman friend where her father hires Moe to solve a two-year old murder that's gone so cold it's positively freezing. Moira Heaton, a talented young political intern was found dead shortly after she closed up the office of New York politico, Steven Brightman. Brightman needs his name cleared of suspicion in Heaton's death so he can revive his career.

But this is the early 1980s. There aren't as many "instantaneous" crime-solving gimmicks as we've become used to, watching CSI and other TV crime shows. And Prager has only a limited number of old contacts from his days as a New York cop. He's going to have to solve the crime in the old way—by relentless research and paying attention to the odd detail.

Prager's perseverance leads him into the past of the intern and the politico, as well as his own. The pre-911 streets of New York come alive in Coleman's evocative prose, as well as the attitude and psychology of an earlier time.

There are lots of questions and not nearly as many answers—the mark of a great novel. Coleman's style is lean and mean on one of its threads and spiraling with imagery on another. The combination makes his writing exciting and hard to forget.

The James Deans is a terrific page-turner, complicated with plenty of twists and made rich with believable, flawed characters. It's only a matter of time before Coleman emerges from the pack and shines in the spotlight.

 

Like a Watered Garden
by Patti Hill
Bethany House
Trade paperback, 318 pages, $12.99
ISBN: 0764229370
Reviewed by Clara Johnston

Mibby Garrett's husband is dead, hit by a driver as he was biking. Their thirteen-year-old son, Kyle, is getting back to real life but that is not happening for Mibby; dreams of Scott disturb and tantalize her. She tries to find some purpose in them. Thank goodness she and Scott had started on their home renovating project ideas. She also has her work.

Garden designing is Mibby's business. She has 20 maintenance clients and most of them are very supportive to her; sometimes they pay her extra or think of ways that can help Kyle and his mother get through this difficult time. It's refreshing to see what a caring group they can be. One of the beauties of this story is the sharing that transpires between Mibby and her clients. Her business partner is her dog, Blink. If you are a dog lover, you will not be disappointed. I like the way she talks to him; I can relate.

Mibby needs more clients. She meets a potentially new customer named Ben Martin. He wants to have a rose bush planted in memory of his wife. Even though she does not want to work for Ben, she knows that working for the McDonald's Restaurant is a real possibility unless she starts bringing home more money. Their relationship is paramount to this story and not always in a predictable fashion.

Then another unpredictable person, Andrea, shows up on the Garrett doorstep with a car that doesn't run well. Helping Mibby sort through her life is her good friend, Louise. Louise is a Christian woman who looks at life scripturally and shares her belief with those around her.

If you enjoy gardening and also want to read a story strong in Christian fiction, family issues, grief and healing, this may be the book for you. This is the debut book for author Patti Hill. I look forward to what comes next.

 

Blood of the Lamb: A John Jordan Mystery
by Michael Lister
Bleak House Books
Paperback, 288 pages, $19.95
ISBN: 1932557059
Reviewed by Francesca Terry

Brutal killings in prison aren't anything new. But what if the victim is a visiting child? And she was in a locked room off the prison chapel? Such is the premise of Michael Lister's second John Jordan Mystery: Blood of the Lamb. It's a taut, carefully crafted mystery that doesn't skim over the teeming violence and racism in prison, nor the repulsiveness of the crime against an unsuspecting child.

What makes the novel transcend the ordinary well-plotted mystery is the character of the story's hero. John Jordan is a flawed minister, a man of God who questions his faith, a man of flesh and blood who wants happiness but finds it painfully elusive. Unlike characters in other openly Christian mysteries, Jordan wears his religious beliefs, not as a mantle that can be taken on and off at will, but as a deeply abiding personal presence. Thus his spiritual conflicts are universal rather than faith-specific, giving his hero an ecumenical appeal—you can empathize with Jordan no matter what your religious beliefs. And if you don't have any religious beliefs, you'll find the character equally appealing because of his deep humanity. Lister actually was a prison chaplain, so he captures the claustrophobia and pent-up violence of prison life with excruciating realism.

Unknown to Jordan, Televangelist Rev. Bobby Earl Caldwell has arranged with the prison warden to a make a crusade appearance at the prison. Jordan intensely dislikes Caldwell's "anti-intellectual religiosity and sentimental spirituality." He feels Caldwell's shallow hellfire and brimstone style of preaching, with its message of guilt and shame, does more harm than good for the prisoners. Worse than Caldwell's preaching style however is his insistence on bringing his photogenic wife Bunny and their adopted mulatto daughter Nicole into the prison with him. It's a security nightmare, subjecting the two females to the stares of sex-starved prisoners, not to mention the rapists and child molesters among them.

His powerlessness to prevent Caldwell's appearance is one more bruise to Jordan's professional ego. Personally, he's not doing too much better. He's falling in love with his married colleague in the prison's classification department, his ex-wife announces their divorce isn't legally final, and his venture into A.A. doesn't get high marks of success, further fraying his already tenuous connection to his Higher Power.

When little Nicole is found beaten to death, there are no obvious suspects. It seems only a miracle will bring about justice. Who would have wanted to kill her, and in such a cold-blooded way? What do prisoners know about life outside their walls? What role does parentage play in spilling the blood of the lamb?

Lister is an author of unquestionable talent and the depth of his characters and their psychological and spiritual longings are refreshing pleasures in a genre often populated with cardboard figures. If he broadens the scope of his future stories and raises the stakes in their plots, Lister should reach a broad readership. The simple small-based stories of his early work, such as this one, could become highly sought-after collector's items.

 

The Rottweiler
by Ruth Rendell
Crown Publishers
Hardcover, 339 pages, $25
ISBN: 1400051098
Reviewed by Shirley H. Wetzel

No Rottweilers were harmed in the writing of this book. No humans were harmed by a Rottweiler either, although the first victim of the serial killer had a nasty bite mark. It turns out to be unrelated to the murder, but the tabloids have bestowed this nickname on the killer, and it sticks as his list of victims grows. This greatly offends the killer, who strives to garrote his victims without touching them at all, other than to pluck some small trinket from them as a memento. Police Inspector Crippen's attention becomes focused on a group of tenants living above an antiques shop in the neighborhood of the murders when one of them reports seeing a mysterious figure running down their street. Inez Ferry, owner of the shop and the building, is horrified to find some of the killer's trophies in the shop, and she begins to wonder if she knows her tenants as well as she thought.

The story centers around the employees of the shop and the building tenants, a colorful cast of eccentrics. Inez herself is the widow of a television star who spends her lonely evenings watching old videos of her husband's show, unable to get on with her life. Ludmila Gogol, who changes accents as often as she changes her bizarre outfits, rents one of the flats. Freddy Perfect is her bouncy and irresponsible fiancé, who has light fingers and poor taste in friends. Will Cobbett is a young man with the good looks of a soccer star and the mind of a ten-year old. His Aunt Becky hopes that Will be able to maintain his independence by living in Inez's building, but events beyond her control makes this less and less likely. Jeremy Quick, a polished, well-mannered young man, is a favored tenant, paying his rent on time and respecting his landlady's private space. The shop assistant Zeinab is an exotic young woman with a theatrical and larcenous bent, stringing along two wealthy suitors while living a double life, financed in part by selling the baubles and bling bling her would-be fiancés give her.

The reader discovers the killer's identity early on, but this does not detract from the story. The various subplots are revealed through each character's eyes, including the killer's, in one of Rendell's most intriguing psychological studies. Her characters are not all especially likable or sympathetic, but they are interesting and complex.

 

The Sapphire Sea
by John B. Robinson
William Morrow
Hardcover, 260 pages $22.95
IBSN: 0060527250
Reviewed by Terri M. Tumlin

Madagascar, the large island off the eastern coast of Africa, is as exotic a location for a suspense thriller as you could want. The French, the Indians and the Malagasy are living in uneasy proximity. The landscape is primitive. Many of the native peoples are heavily involved in ancestor-based religions. The civil authorities and the military are as corrupt as anywhere in the world. Bribery is the only was to try to do business and even then, gemologist Lonny Cushman could lose his property and his life, bribe or no bribe.

As Lonny rides his motorcycle through an area called King's Reserve, his glimpse of blue in a field excites him so much that he crashes his bike. As he gets up, he sees a peasant holding up a blue stone, the largest sapphire Lonny has ever seen. He negotiates for the stone, paying the peasant a princely sum. For Lonny, the stone represents money enough to return to New York and pick up a respected life with the opportunity to be an active father to his young daughter.

Lonny's plans are destroyed by the peasant's busy mouth. Soon everyone with power and guns knows that Lonny has the sapphire. They each want it and are willing to kill him to get it. Enter a beautiful disillusioned African-American CIA agent, Malika, undercover as a U.S. Embassy official. When he turns to her for help, she ends up in his bed, but does not make things any easier for him.

John Robinson deftly creates a world that is extremely foreign to first world readers. The sights, sounds, smells and lives of the people of Madagascar are sharply portrayed. The map of Madagascar in the front of the book, however, provides confusion instead of enlightenment. The action of the story takes place in various fictional locations on the island. The map shows only the real cities, leaving the reader, if they consult the map, to guess where the author locating the action.

But the story is Lonny and his struggles to escape and survive. While Lonny is in no way a paragon, he is a believable and sympathetic protagonist that engages the reader. An excellent read for those who like hair-raising escapes.

 

Deadmistress
by Carole B. Shmurak
Sterling House Publishers
Paperback, 184 pages, $12.95
ISBN: 1563153521
Reviewed by Kim Malo

Dr. Susan Lombardi was just one of the staff members Sabena Lazlo had driven away from Wintonbury Academy for Girls since taking over as headmistress eight years before. Susan is back on campus doing behavioral research for the college where she now works when she hears on the news that Sabena has been found in her office, dead of a gunshot wound.

Despite the ambiguity of initial reports that it could be either suicide or homicide, Susan just knows that Sabena was no suicide and must have been killed by someone her manipulative egotism had finally driven over the edge. Subsequent reports back the homicide suspicion, but also put one of Susan's dear friends at the top of the suspect list. There may have been plenty of other people with reason to hate or fear Sabena, but history teacher John Haviland was the one who publicly threatened her in a staff meeting.

Susan is just as sure that gentle, humorous John couldn't have committed the murder as she was that it was murder in the first place; however, she seems to be alone in thinking so. Not just the police, but everyone involved seems sure John killed her, with nothing to be gained by digging further. Is that just to protect themselves and their own secrets from becoming public—secrets that might provide other people with better motives for the killing?

Susan's husband Swash is quick to remind her that she knows nothing of criminal investigation and really has concerns of her own she should be concentrating on. However, disapproving as he might be, Swash is realistic enough to know that Susan will get involved regardless and helps her research Sabena's past on the net and structure a suspect list that eventually helps point to the killer. In a neat, cliché-avoiding twist on the usual amateur sleuth with a love interest on the police force to provide the detection expertise she lacks, Susan gets even more help from one of her students whose checkered career includes a degree in Criminal Justice and a stint as a P.I.

This is an entertaining story that offers a friendly nod to the amateur sleuth puzzles of the golden age, updated for the modern world with such things as use of the Internet. There's a cast of characters at the beginning, real detection that includes fair play to the reader about laying out the clues, a timetable to be sorted out, a suspect list of motives and opportunities to be pored over -all bound within the narrow confines of a close community of people who know each other both too well and not well enough.

It would probably be classified as a cozy by some, but really better fits the label "traditional." It does involve an amateur sleuth, with a focus on relationships and little visible violence or signs of those mean streets. But while it's not particularly dark, neither is it coy or cutesy, as many people think of cozies. It's a solid, enjoyable story involving the sort of people you and I could know (and probably do) trying to deal with both ordinary (the boss from hell, whispers about who is doing what with whom and why, et al.) and extraordinary circumstances. Set in an academic background that rings very true, from the problems inherent in a house full of adolescent girls at Wintonbury, including the I'm-smarter-than-you manipulative politics among academics at Metropolitan University, where Susan teaches.

The author comes from those worlds and clearly understands them very well. But really, this is a story about puzzles and people and that's where it shines. You believe in the people and their relationships, from Sabena as boss-from-hell to Susan worrying about Swash's disapproval to the inevitable complications between various pairs of opposite sexes. All wrapped around a nice puzzle to solve, with the clues laid out before you (along with the odd red herring), inviting you to get to the truth before Susan, or at least cheer her on as she beats you to it. A very fast, enjoyable read.

 

Murder By Committee

Read past installments and find out more about Murder By Committee

Gordon Aalborg, author of this month's wild and wooly chapter, is the author of The Specialist, a Five Star Original Mystery. He is married to mystery author Denise (Deni) Dietz, and lives on Vancouver Island. His favorite mystery authors include John D. MacDonald, James W. Hall, James Lee Burke and John Sandford, but it was the influence of his mystery author wife which forced him into writing mystery himself. He cannot (and would not dare) attempt to emulate her style. Buckle up, campers, this ride is bumpy...

CHAPTER 12
By Gordon Aalborg

There is much to be said for the acronym KISS—Keep It Simple, Stupid!—and most of it roared around in my weary brain as we made the descent to Betty's "special basement room."

The four of us, Betty, Guthrie, that damned cat Arnold and me, stood in the slowly sinking elevator, all looking at anything but each other as the machine descended.

It's a sad commentary on the human condition that we do things like that, but you just notice for yourself next time you're in an elevator—nobody ever looks at anyone else! They look up, down, around, or stand there with their eyes closed, but they never... ever... look directly at anyone else.

It's because being crammed into something like an elevator puts each of us into somebody else's comfort zone, I guess, and them into ours. So we avoid eye contact. It happens in airplanes, too, and for some of the same reasons.

My apprehension about Betty's secret chamber being some sort of esoteric torture chamber got worse and worse, but it was cushioned-thankfully-by my overactive brain trying to figure out what another acronym actually meant...OTIS, the name of her secret organization.

OTIS... in mirror image... = 21TO... A secret code involving Blackjack? Betty was, after all, a gambler, had already admitted to her people being gaming freaks and computer geeks. Out to save the world from computer fraud, she'd said.

So... Twenty-one TO. 21 to 0 made no sense, but the blackjack connection surely couldn't be ignored, either. I looked down, around, up at the ceiling, at the heavy door of the elevator, at the control panel...

And then at the manufacturer's label, whereupon I nearly barfed up the computer chip I'd gone to so much trouble to protect by swallowing it.

The realization struck me like the proverbial thunderclap as I stood there, weaponless by idiotic choice, trying to look nonchalant as the elevator sank slowly downward.

Had I really managed to complicate something this obviously simple? Even so much as thought of such nonsense? I had to close my eyes in shame.

I was blushing. I couldn't not blush, not while feeling so incredibly stupid. Not with the sudden realization that Betty and Guthrie and probably even that stupid cat were looking at me, and just had to be laughing themselves sick.

An over-expectation, perhaps. When I did look up, Guthrie wasn't laughing. But there was a smug look in his eyes and a twist to his lower lip that told me he was probably biting back laughter. Betty, the cow, merely looked smug, and Arnold—busily "making bread" on Betty's most obvious assets—had his own eyes closed in bliss.

Then we hit bottom, the elevator doors sighed open, and my shame was washed away by astonishment. Special basement room indeed! It was far, far more than just a room...

It was a casino!

A casino in miniature, to be sure, with everything not quite full-sized, and a strange, ethereal atmosphere to the place. But it had one of everything-roulette wheel, black-jack table, craps layout... even a single one-armed bandit.

"This is just too twee for words," I said, lapsing into a British expression I've always liked ... and because I couldn't think of anything else to say. The whole thing was just so... strange that I half expected to see Alice or the Mad Hatter emerge from somewhere and launch a gambling spree.

Betty, with Arnold still clutched to her bosom, smiled pleasantly. "It is rather nice, isn't it?" she remarked to nobody in particular. She led the way as we strolled through the facility, pointing out particular features (the chips were all miniature chocolate bars, for instance) as we went.

But what she would not do, nor would Guthrie—damn his hide!—was make any attempt to clarify why they'd chosen the name of an elevator manufacturer to represent their secret society of computer specialists out to save the world from computer fraud.

"All will be revealed," she kept saying as she pointed out cutesy little feature after cutesy little feature of her "special basement room."

So I played her little game. What choice did I have, after all? My trusty Smith and Wesson was sitting on the mantelpiece upstairs, I didn't have any obvious good reason to trust these people—who kept insisting that "they" trusted me. And I didn't have any real good reason not to trust them, either.

The most impressive feature of the whole shebang, just by the way, was a totally automated wet bar with a robot server that Betty claimed could manufacture any known cocktail in the world... in a millisecond.

It was no faster than that in producing my choice, which was a simple Scotch and soda (top quality Scotch, too) but watching the thing flail about in apparent chaos—only to deliver a perfect James Bond special martini for Betty just as quickly—was significantly impressive.

What I didn't see, but probably should have expected, was that any robot that sophisticated might also react to secret signals to drug my drink. The glass was only half full (or half empty if you're a pessimist) when I felt a too-familiar haze clamping down on my vision. A moment later, all went black.

I swam up out of the blackness some time later, assisted by that damned cat Arnold doing his "making bread" thing... this time on my bosom. "Stop groping me, you feline felon," I growled, reaching up to brush him away as I tried to figure out where the hell I was. Not black, exactly, but it did seem to be an extremely confined space, barely large enough hold the comfortable divan on which I lay.

Then things got very strange.

"Not groping. Merely trying to wake you," said the cat, whose voice did what its paws hadn't fully accomplished, and a damned sight quicker, too.

"Stop that," I said, still a trifle groggy. "You can't talk. Cats do not talk."

"Can too. Just did."

"Damn it, Arnold," I said, exasperation getting the better of me. "You can't! Simple as that. And stop with the groping, already, or I'll have your guts for guitar-strings. You're giving me conniptions, for goodness' sake. Or should that be cat-niptions, I wonder?"

"Loooove catnip," he said in what had to be sexiest voice I've ever heard. And promptly leapt back up and tried to grope me some more.

"Stop it! Stop it... stop it... stop it! No groping. None! And no talking, either. You're making it impossible for me to think."

Arnold merely stared back at me from those inscrutable pussy-cat eyes, although I fancied I saw the beginnings of a smirk from beneath his tidy whiskers. Then he leapt from my bosom to the floor, let out the most astonishing caterwaul, and began clawing his way up what appeared to me to be a solid wall.

A wall that suddenly became a door... a door that suddenly opened to reveal...