Dumped from the lead role on her detective show, snubbed by Hollywood and hurting for cash, TV star Marla Dane sees only one way out: running home to Minnesota. There she can lick her wounds, eat ice cream and check up on her seemingly capricious sister. Bonus: She’ll never again have to think about catching killers. But that’s before a resident in her sister’s condo building is found dead on the front lawn. There’s just something about Marla that makes the neighbors and overworked cops think she can help solve the case, no matter how many times she tells them she was just a pretend sleuth who never worked off-script. Trusting that Marla can get an insider’s take on the suspects, the police chief pairs her with Rex Alcorn, an ex-cop who lives in the same condo complex. Rex is less than enthusiastic about working with a lay person who’s also a celebrity, but he owes the chief from way back, and doing this favor should get the guy off his back. And even Marla has to admit he’s not bad to look at. But Marla’s scripted takedowns didn’t prepare her for murky clues, quirky condo residents and the cagey methods of her new partner. Can she and Rex solve the crime before an all-too-real killer puts them in danger, too?
No good deed goes unpunished, as television star Marla Dane learns the hard way. The recently fired TV detective, trying to figure out her next move at her sister’s Minnesota condo, reluctantly agrees to sub as Water Girl at a weekend pickleball match. Which makes her the first suspect of many when the team captain turns up dead. Eloise Wallace, owner of a local PR company, will never receive the title Boss of the Year. She’s dragged her staff, her old college roommate, and even her ex-husband and ex-employees onto her pickleball team. No wonder their success on the court is so sad. They all have reasons for wanting her dead, and Marla and former cop Rex Alcorn are enlisted to figure out who poisoned her. As Marla’s sister Kitty distracts them with a new obsession, pie baking, Marla and Rex find their suspects crusty and evasive. The victim excelled at making everyone around her miserable, so what did the killer have to gain by staying in her life — or ensuring her death? The answer may be more toxic than either of them bargained for.
Sydney Bonner overhears a fellow mah jongg player arguing on the phone with her husband and realizes the couple’s “perfect marriage” isn’t all it appears to be. When the husband is found dead a few days later, the widow prevails upon Sydney and her three friends—Marianne, Kat and Micki—to find out who really killed him. Though none of these four take-charge retirees has any training as detectives, the women agree to launch a secret investigation. As they dig under the happy veneer of their community’s social life, they find more than enough suspects, from shady ladies to resentful golf buddies, to keep them looking over their shoulders. Could the murderer be lurking among the talent in a chaotic production put on by Sydney’s husband, who will do anything to keep busy in retirement? Could the sheriff, who may have more than a professional interest in chanteuse Kat, end up pinning the crime on the women instead? Each discovery during their investigations keeps them running as they close in on the killer—but the killer may also be closing in on them.
Wedding planner Hadley Mayhew makes the mistake of sharing with a new client her mother’s bizarre request to help her find a man, never contemplating the woman will think the idea of a mature child helping their parent reenter the dating game might be great fodder for a reality TV show. Even more surprising, her client wants Hadley and her mother to be her first subjects. Kevin Barkley had every reason to believe he’d be a huge success as a filmmaker when he won his film school’s most prestigious award. But for reasons he doesn’t understand, fate, or what seems to be fate, keeps working against him. Several producing jobs have eluded him, notably a recent offer that was withdrawn at the last minute. To make matters worse, the showrunner has been spreading rumors that Kevin is difficult. Temporarily unemployed, Kevin is unable to refuse his aunt’s offer to executive produce and direct her latest project, a reality show about senior dating, especially since the money involved is obscene. There’s just one catch: He must agree to hire Hadley Mayhew, his former best friend in college, as his writer and assistant producer. If they are to work together, can his forgive her for revealing his fiancée was cheating on him?
How could a thirty-something man fall to his death from a fourth-floor balcony he knows is defective? That’s the question freelance writer Micki Demetrius is asked to answer by the man’s grieving mother, Clarissa White, who refuses to believe his death was an unfortunate accident. But when the authorities determine it was homicide, Micki is shut out of her investigative efforts. Giving up is easier said than done for Micki. She can’t resist a mystery, and suspicious characters won’t leave Clarissa alone, from the woman claiming a stake in the victim’s life to a cagey character who wants his business. As the threat to Clarissa grows, Micki feels compelled to help her in spite of the danger. Micki’s three mah jongg pals—Sydney, Marianne and Kat—are drawn into the mystery, but the retirees have their own challenges. Syd and husband Trip do grandparent duty while their daughter deals with marital issues. Marianne “finds herself” by writing a one-act play. And Kat must decide how public to go with her growing friendship with the sheriff. Together, they must connect the dots in a nefarious web of greed, neglect, secrecy and murder.
A raucous and surprising novel filled with wonderful details about wine, Rex Pickett's Sideways is also a thought-provoking and funny book about men, women, and human relationships. The basis for the 2004 comedy-drama road movie of the same name starring Paul Giamatti and Thomas Haden Church. Sideways is the story of two friends-Miles and Jack-going away together for the last time to steep themselves in everything that makes it good to be young and single: pinot, putting, and prowling bars. In the week before Jack plans to marry, the pair heads out from Los Angeles to the Santa Ynez wine country. For Jack, the tasting tour is Seven Days to D-Day, his final stretch of freedom. For Miles--who has divorced his wife, is facing an uncertain career and has lost his passion for living-the trip is a week long opportunity to evaluate his past, his future and himself.
Beware the east wind! It's hurricane season in Florida, and everyone's attention is focused on preparing for the latest tempest. But in Serendipity Springs, mah jongg pals Marianne, Sydney, Micki and Kat are caught in a different kind of whirlwind--a mesmerizing murder case involving a slain hypnotist/chef and the woman police suspect of doing her in, her embittered catering partner, Portia.Tasked by Portia to help clear her name, and at the risk of infuriating Kat's sheriff boyfriend, Marianne and her friends discover there are more than enough suspects--and secrets--to go around. Wary of getting themselves into more dangerous situations, Marianne and Syd agree to let their protective spouses join the hunt, even if their scheming husbands are really in it for the action, not bodyguard duty. As they dig into the hypnotist's explosive files, more and more questions arise. Was she blackmailing her clients? Did her husband knock her off to gain access to those secrets? And is Portia telling them everything she knows? The sleuths pile their own deceptions on top of the suspects' lies as a dangerous storm gathers steam offshore. When will the east wind strike, and will the hurricane's merciless eye reveal a killer?
Oh, her aching feet! Micki Demetrius questions her sanity for agreeing to compete in Serendipity Springs' Annual Charleston Challenge when clearly she and her partner, Guy Whitney, have no chance of winning or even placing. Just ask the reigning champion, who points out their low odds of taking home the trophy every chance she gets.But then, Micki's only dancing in this contest because Guy wouldn't enter without her, and the poor man needs something to occupy his days. Retirement hasn't come easy for him. Not that there's anything special going on between them, as much as Guy would like or his daughter suspects. There isn't, is there?Micki can't wait to put their performance behind them--until one of the top competitors is found dead on the ballroom floor. The sheriff warns Micki and her three mah jongg pals not to play amateur sleuth again, but he can't stop this persistent freelance journalist from pursuing her inside scoop, with a little help from her friends. The trouble with being on the inside, though, is that being so close to her sketchy subjects might just let the killer get dangerously close to her.The Mah Jongg Mystery series, features four retired amateur sleuths who live in a small Florida town, all female and all friends who play the game of mah jongg together. Though they don't set out to investigate murder, after their first experience in this story, others start looking to them to help investigate subsequent homicides and questionable accidents. In this first book, Sydney Bonner takes the lead, although she turns to her three friends for help. Though this series features four protagonists, the others will take the lead in subsequent stories. Two are married, one is divorced and the fourth, who has been single all her life while she tended to her ailing mother, now finds herself the object of the sheriff's attention in this series. The four don't seek out murder; somehow the circumstances and those affected drag them in. Meanwhile, as they attempt to gather information, life goes on in their community in such activities as a women's club, a social group for those over 50, real estate transactions, numerous stops at the local coffeehouse, and even a shopping trip to Naples. Sydney's husband, Trip, and her friend Marianne Putnam's husband, Beau, are golf buddies who spend many a day on the course. When not there, Trip is busy seeking to build a new post retirement life, and Beau is often prevailed upon to join in Trip's latest activity. Kat Faulkner has lived a frugal life until winning big in a lottery shortly after her mother's death; suddenly, Kat has money and doesn't know how to spend it. But her divorced friend and freelance writer, Micki Demetrius, does, even if it's to guide Kat through a makeover and wardrobe change for her cabaret.This is the seventh book in the Mah Jongg Mystery series, although each book stands alone. Readers don't need to know how to play mah jongg or even like the game to enjoy the rest of the story, which besides solving a murder spotlights friendship and community.
This book explores the Gothic mode as it appears in the literature, visual arts, and culture of different areas of Latin America. Focusing on works from authors in Mexico, Central America, the Caribbean, the Andes, Brazil, and the Southern Cone, the essays in this volume illuminate the existence of native representations of the Gothic, while also exploring the presence of universal archetypes of terror and horror. Through the analysis of global and local Gothic topics and themes, they evaluate the reality of a multifaceted territory marked by a shifting colonial and postcolonial relationship with Europe and the United States. The book asks questions such as: Is there such a thing as "Latin American Gothic" in the same sense that there is an "American Gothic" and "British Gothic"? What are the main elements that particularly characterize Latin American Gothic? How does Latin American Gothic function in the context of globalization? What do these elements represent in relation to specific national literatures? What is the relationship between the Gothic and the Postcolonial? What can Gothic criticism bring to the study of Latin American cultural manifestations and, conversely, what can these offer the Gothic? The analysis performed here reflects a body of criticism that understands the Gothic as a global phenomenon with specific manifestations in particular territories while also acknowledging the effects of "Globalgothic" on a transnational and transcultural level. Thus, the volume seeks to open new spaces and areas of scholarly research and academic discussion both regionally and globally with the presentation of a solid analysis of Latin American texts and other cultural phenomena which are manifestly related to the Gothic world.
Dina Maitland spends almost as much time extricating her movie star mother from personal messes as she invests in her forensic accounting job. So much time, she may no longer have a job once she cleans up her mother's latest fiasco, her engagement to a twenty-something film student. Vowing it's the last time she puts herself on clean-up duty, Dina sets off for South Carolina to stop the pending nuptials, and along the way, almost literally, runs into the father of the groom. Ben Cutler has troubles of his own with his business under attack from competitors and a government audit looming. Not one to trust women, he must team up with Dina to balance his books as well as stop the wedding. Though unwillingly thrown together Dina and Ben are surprised to find their interest and passion for each other growing. Can they face their pasts in order to create a union of their own?
