Mystery Notes
by Staff -- Publishers Weekly, 1/2/2006
FEBRUARY PUBLICATIONS
Serious mystery fans will welcome Dreams of Justice: Mysteries as Social Documents, a collection of thematically arranged reviews by Dick Adler, who writes the Crime Watch column for the Chicago Tribune. Adler's essay on the legendary Anthony Boucher is particularly good, while he's also strong on the African-American experience. (Poisoned Pen, $16.95 paper 128p ISBN 1-59058-179-2)
Vietnam-era intrigue fuels Mark de Castrique's Foolish Undertaking, his thoughtful and timely third contemporary regional mystery to feature Gainesboro, N.C., undertaker Barry Clayton (after 2004's Dangerous Undertaking). Parallels with Iraq resonate throughout Clayton's risk-filled investigation involving the theft of a heroic Montagnard's body, veterans of the Vietnam conflict and some heavy-duty politicos protecting their interests. (Poisoned Pen, $24.95 264p ISBN 1-59058-227-6)
In Nancy Atherton's Aunt Dimity and the Deep Blue Sea, her soothing 11th cozy starring U.S. ex-pat Lori Shepherd (after 2005's Aunt Dimity and the Next of Kin), Lori and her twin sons, Will and Rob, retreat to the scenic Scottish isle of Erinskil after Lori's lawyer husband, Bill Willis, receives death threats via e-mail. The ideal refuge, however, soon becomes a hotbed of trouble, and Lori's forced to depend more on her own instincts than the advice of the ghostly Aunt Dimity, who communicates through journal entries, to protect her sons' lives as well as her own. (Viking, $22.95 256p ISBN 0-670-03476-2)
Philadelphia school teacher Amanda Pepper looks into Halloween pranks that take a deadly turn in Antony-winner Gillian Roberts's A Hole in Juan: An Amanda Pepper Mystery, the 13th entry in this popular cozy series (after 2004's Till the End of Tom). Fortunately, Amanda's new husband, who's a private eye, is ready to lend an investigative hand. (Ballantine, $23.95 256p ISBN 0-345-48019-8)
In Conrad Allen's charming seventh shipboard historical, Murder on the Oceanic: A Mystery Featuring George Porter Dillman and Genevieve Masefield, the sleuthing husband-and-wife team investigate the murder of J.P. Morgan's bodyguard as well as the theft of art treasures the great financier is transporting from Europe to New York. Allen (Murder on the Lusitania, etc.) supplies the usual colorful supporting cast, from a truculent artist who paints nudes to a dissolute rake who hounds Genevieve. (St. Martin's Minotaur, $23.95 288p ISBN 0-312-34285-3)
