What Annabelle would undoubtedly call a “hard-boiled cozy” is unlikely to appeal much to fans of either, unless they’re...
Burke continues her genre-bending saga of a movie-crazed malaprop who yearns to be a private eye.
Now that her boyfriend Mickey Paxton’s at home in New York keeping an eye on Bonkers, her cat, Annabelle Starkey (Jump the Gun, 2013) feels safe visiting her parents, who just moved to Portland from Palo Alto. Safe, that is, until she discovers that someone on the plane took her backpack stuffed with personal items and left her holding a similar bag containing nothing but a puffy jacket and a Beretta Bobcat. A mysterious caller named Claudia sends Annabelle scurrying to the Japanese Garden in the hope of retrieving her belongings, but on her arrival she finds Claudia knocked out and her backpack nowhere in sight. Retreating to her parents’ to soothe herself with a DVD of The Heat, she’s promptly kidnapped, duct-taped, and thrown into a van. She escapes barely in time to have drinks and dinner with her parents’ gay neighbors, Sal and Drew, who’ve just agreed to become the elder Starkeys’ partners in Sunshine Bakery. Eventually, Mickey and Annabelle’s best friend, tough-guy cop Luis Maldonado, arrives in Portland, but even he can’t prevent Annabelle from getting riled up over Anne Elliot’s abusive father in Persuasion. So Mickey himself, who can’t resist pleas like “Kiss me again, like it’s your last chance to kick the ball on second down,” rushes to Annabelle’s side to help her discover who took her undies, who cold-cocked Claudia, and who the hell owns the Beretta.
What Annabelle would undoubtedly call a “hard-boiled cozy” is unlikely to appeal much to fans of either, unless they’re really stuck on Portland.Pub Date: Jan. 5, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4642-0484-5
Page Count: 212
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: Oct. 19, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
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
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