cover image Miss Julia Takes the Wheel

Miss Julia Takes the Wheel

Ann B. Ross. Viking, $27 (320p) ISBN 978-0-525-56048-7

Bestseller Ross’s winning 21st mystery set in Abbotsville, N.C. (after 2018’s Miss Julia Raises the Roof), finds Miss Julia beside herself with what-ifs after her personal physician, Bob Hargrove, tells her that he’s going on a months-long vacation. Bob has hired a fill-in doctor, Don Crawford, but Miss Julia won’t be satisfied till she vets the new man herself, so she hosts a small dinner party whose guests include Don and his wife, Lauren, and two couples she and her husband, Sam, are close to. Reviews afterward are mixed, but Don seems generally okay, while everyone feels Lauren is in dire need of socialization. Meanwhile, 15-year-old Lloyd Pickens’s dad, PI J.D. Pickens, plans to buy him a car, another source of worry for Miss Julia, and Lloyd is also dealing with the horrors of a Sadie Hawkins Day dance. Soon enough, there are signs of nefarious activity involving Don, and the end results are very bad indeed. Miss Julia is not as savvy this time as she usually is, but she’s still a true delight. [em]Agent: Deborah Schneider, Gelfman Schneider Literary. (Apr.) [/em]