Even the hilarious solecisms (“she wouldn’t hear from Tyler Parish unless she instigated another call”) can’t lighten YA...
Junior high-school teacher Katie Hassworth, traumatized when prepubescent Jon McCartel opened fire in the classroom—killing a classmate and wounding her before turning the gun on himself—has decided to try a less hazardous profession. Now she and Jon’s dad have joined forces as McCartel and Hassworth, Private Investigators, whose caseload normally leans heavily toward drug-related cases, at least until perky Diana Dade, who rents Katie an apartment in the upper floor of her Key West mansion, begs the willowy blond sleuth to solve the murder of Diana’s mother, socialite Alexa Chitting, conked with a conch in her plush marina office. Since Alexa had been on the verge of writing a new will leaving her vast holdings to the Key West Preservation Group, there’s no dearth of suspects: Alexa’s husband Porter, her lover Tyler Parish, her secretary Mary Bethel, even Diana’s husband Randy all stand to lose a bundle once the new will is signed. And Katie interviews every last one of them, along with nasty Elizabeth Wright, who manages the Department of Community Affairs and pregnant Angie Garcia, Po Chitting’s Cuban lover. But the interview that gives Katie the most bang for her buck is with Key West’s mayor Rex Layton, who wines her and dines her and gives her all the goosebumps that ex-husband David (or, as he's known in Chapter 24, Chuck) couldn’t generate.
Even the hilarious solecisms (“she wouldn’t hear from Tyler Parish unless she instigated another call”) can’t lighten YA author Francis’s sodden first novel for putative adults.Pub Date: April 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-7862-5029-1
Page Count: 244
Publisher: Five Star/Gale Cengage
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2003
A murder is committed in a stalled transcontinental train in the Balkans, and every passenger has a watertight alibi. But Hercule Poirot finds a way.
**Note: This classic Agatha Christie mystery was originally published in England as Murder on the Orient Express, but in the United States as Murder in the Calais Coach. Kirkus reviewed the book in 1934 under the original US title, but we changed the title in our database to the now recognizable title Murder on the Orient Express. This is the only name now known for the book. The reason the US publisher, Dodd Mead, did not use the UK title in 1934 was to avoid confusion with the 1932 Graham Greene novel, Orient Express.
Pub Date: Feb. 28, 1934
ISBN: 978-0062073495
Page Count: -
Publisher: Dodd, Mead
Review Posted Online: Sept. 20, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1934
The parts with Nero Wolfe, the only character Goldsborough brings to life, are almost worth waiting for.
In Archie Goodwin's 15th adventure since the death of his creator, Rex Stout, his gossipy Aunt Edna Wainwright lures him from 34th Street to his carefully unnamed hometown in Ohio to investigate the death of a well-hated bank president.
Tom Blankenship, the local police chief, thinks there’s no case since Logan Mulgrew shot himself. But Archie’s mother, Marjorie Goodwin, and Aunt Edna know lots of people with reason to have killed him. Mulgrew drove rival banker Charles Purcell out of business, forcing Purcell to get work as an auto mechanic, and foreclosed on dairy farmer Harold Mapes’ spread. Lester Newman is convinced that Mulgrew murdered his ailing wife, Lester’s sister, so that he could romance her nurse, Carrie Yeager. And Donna Newman, Lester’s granddaughter, might have had an eye on her great-uncle’s substantial estate. Nor is Archie limited to mulling over his relatives’ gossip, for Trumpet reporter Verna Kay Padgett, whose apartment window was shot out the night her column raised questions about the alleged suicide, is perfectly willing to publish a floridly actionable summary of the leading suspects that delights her editor, shocks Archie, and infuriates everyone else. The one person missing is Archie’s boss, Nero Wolfe (Death of an Art Collector, 2019, etc.), and fans will breathe a sigh of relief when he appears at Marjorie’s door, debriefs Archie, notices a telltale clue, prepares dinner for everyone, sleeps on his discovery, and arranges a meeting of all parties in Marjorie’s living room in which he names the killer.
The parts with Nero Wolfe, the only character Goldsborough brings to life, are almost worth waiting for.Pub Date: May 19, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5040-5988-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Mysterious Press
Review Posted Online: March 1, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2020
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
