cover image Hard Candy

Hard Candy

Mary Lynn Baxter. Mira Books, $5.99 (0pp) ISBN 978-1-55166-440-8

""Not only had he kissed his main suspect, he wanted to fuck her, as well,"" is one of many bits of tacky internal dialogue from bully detective, Ryker Delany, regarding his prime murder suspect in this one-dimensional, raunchy crime drama by the author of Autumn Awakening. When Blythe Lambert's dead husband washes up on the shores of a local lake, Ryker would love nothing more than to pin the murder on her. (Apparently she'd ticked him off once by mistaking him for one of her landscaping company's laborers). Bitchy and self-absorbed, Blythe doesn't like Ryker any more than he likes her, but she likes him well enough to hop into bed with him, which doesn't seem to complicate their hate/hate relationship. Between battling her in-laws, searching for a missing will and lamenting her failing business, Blythe is dogged by someone who wants the mysterious but valuable ""Hard Candy"" that her husband supposedly had in his possession when he died. But Blythe and crew are so distasteful that it's hard to care about her predicament or whether she gets out of it. (Aug.)