A LOVELY NIGHT TO KILL

Dreadful second novel (following Money Leads to Murder, not reviewed) featuring private-eye Daisy Marlow, who encases her heft in satin undies, dubs her gun ""Maggie"" and her car ""Edna Elizabeth,"" and chortles ""Poss-i-damn-toot-ly!"" whenever she recognizes a clue, a motive, or whatever. The case: a dognapping, tying into conflagration at a campsite trailer that kills two kids and their dad, and eventually leads to a ritzy Vegas clinic run by Dr. Janer (a drunk) and his lover, nurse Cora Billings, who are treating the burned, battered, and raped mom from the trailer (someone dumped her in their driveway). En route to a thoroughly unconvincing conclusion, there's police work by Vegas Sheriff Sam Milo, info from Daisy's secretary's mysterious sources, and a batch of interviews conducted by Daisy that are notable only for their implausibility. Plus there are assorted odds and ends: alligator shoes on a janitor; a chauffeur and his brother; Mrs. Horton and her bridge club; banter that isn't cute, witty, tough or sexy, but merely smarmy, with the sort of nudging and leering common to prepubescent boys/girls. An out-and-out fatality. Let it rest, unread, in peace.