« "Lennon Revealed" by Larry Kane | Main | "Death and Judgment" by Donna Leon »
March 12, 2007
"Murder on a Hot Tin Roof" by Amanda Matestsky
Take a trip back to the 1950s when men were men and women were second class citizens (or maybe I should make that men were insufferable and women were insignificant). Actually, Amanda Matestsky has penned a fun mystery series set in the mid-1950s “starring” Paige Turner, a Korean War widow who works at Daring Detective magazine. She is the best writer on staff, but as the only woman is mostly relegated to secretarial and servant duties (filing, coffee making, etc.). But she also always ends up in the middle of a major homicide, writes up the inside story for her magazine, then gets those stories picked up as dime store true crime novels. Paige lives in NYC, has a quirky artist best friend (who has a bad beat poet boyfriend – his poetry is bad, the guy’s ok), and the obligatory homicide detective boyfriend (if she lived in a small town, he would have been police chief/sheriff). The stories are fun and filled with 1950s pop culture. In the fourth and most recent entry in the series, Paige is investigating the death of Ben Gazzara’s understudy in the new hit Broadway play, “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.” We visit the Actor’s Studio, where our murder victim was studying under Lee Strasberg, interrogate people who knew the actor at gay hangouts in the Village, and swelter in the July heat at a time when air conditioning was not ubiquitous. If this series is new to you, start with the first book, Murders Prefer Blondes.
ISBN: 0-425-21293-9
Pam, reserves
Posted by jnardine at March 12, 2007 09:46 AM