WIDOW'S WREATH

A favor for a relative involves a poet and sleuth in yet another murder.

At 92, Victoria Trumbull (Trumpet of Death, 2017, etc.) has lived her whole life in a big old house on beautiful Martha’s Vineyard. When her distant cousin Penny Arbuthnot asked to hold her wedding there, Victoria agreed, but now she’s shocked to discover it’s a huge extravaganza with tents, sound systems, and more than 200 guests. And then the electrician wiring the ceremony finds a body wrapped in a sheet hanging in the seldom-used cellar. Though Penny and her fiance, Rocco Bufano, each think the other is wealthy, Penny’s maxed out her credit and Rocco’s been disowned by his father, Giovanni Bufano, whose Mafia connections make him dangerous. The murder victim, whom Rocco claims not to know, looks amazingly like Rocco himself, and Rocco worries that the man may have been killed by one of his own creditors as a warning to pay up. On the island for the wedding are Rocco’s brother, Dominic, who arrives at Victoria’s house dead drunk, and his two stepbrothers, Cosimo and Caesar. All the friends Rocco’s invited to fill out the groom’s side hate him, and they’re all planning his demise—though he’s such a narcissist that he has no idea so many people wish him dead. Since they all turn up at Victoria’s sooner or later, the police use her and the island’s gossip network as fonts of information while wondering if Rocco will escape death long enough for them to find the killer.

Riggs’ heroine has a smaller role than usual in an exciting and twisted tale of hatred and family honor that will keep you guessing until the end.