Murder at the Spirit Lounge

Former nun Nora Breen investigates the death of a psychic in Kidd’s clever sequel to Murder at Gulls Nest. In postwar England, Nora has abandoned her vocation at a Carmelite monastery and moved to Kent, where she’s befriended DI Hilary Rideout. Rideout asks her to join him on a visit to Dolores Chimes, a psychic who’s asked him to look into a jewelry theft. Based on what Nora gleans from Dolores’s housemaid, Gladys, the theft was only a pretext for Dolores to invite Rideout—whom Dolores claims to have learned all about from the spirits of the dead—to her next séance. He agrees to attend, but the gathering ends tragically with Dolores’s death, possibly from fright. Despite the bizarre lack of physical evidence, Nora suspects Dolores may have been killed, a theory that gathers momentum when other séance guests turn up dead. Fearing that Rideout might be next on the killer’s list, Nora draws on the sleuthing skills she developed in the previous book to launch an inquiry. Kidd has fun dreaming up apparently impossible deaths for her victims, and the resolution satisfies. For cozy fans, this is a treat. Agent: Amelia Atlas, CAA. (June)