cover image Hold a Scorpion

Hold a Scorpion

Melodie Johnson Howe. Pegasus Crime (Norton, dist.), $25.95 (240p) ISBN 978-1-60598-967-9

Early in Edgar-finalist Howe’s atmospheric but addled sequel to 2013’s City of Mirrors, Hollywood actress Diana Poole spots a strange woman waving at her outside her Malibu bungalow, then walking into the speeding Pacific Coast Highway traffic, with fatal results. The following day, a witness to the tragedy tries to pump Diana for information at gunpoint, demanding to know the whereabouts of a scorpion. Since the only scorpion Diana knows is a diamond-encrusted vintage bracelet given by a mysterious admirer to her late mother, screen siren Nora Poole, and missing since Nora’s death the previous year, she can’t resist investigating further. Threats start coming from multiple quarters, including the pricey drug rehab facility from which it turns out the dead woman ran away. Diana and hunky PI Leo Heath, her now off-again love interest, must contend with motley players chasing the scorpion—a sly tip of the fedora to The Maltese Falcon?—as the fast-moving plot careens wildly toward a truly preposterous conclusion. [em]Agent: Helen Zimmerman, Helen Zimmerman Literary Agency. (Oct.) [/em]