And a Puzzle to Die On : A Puzzle Lady Mystery

Rating:
Summary: Inelegant but still fun
Review: Enlisted to investigate whether reasonable doubt exists that repugnant Darryl Daigue actually committed the murder he was convicted of 20 years ago, Cora "The Puzzle Lady" Felton stirs up one hornets nest after another in "And a Puzzle to Die On." It's the sixth in Parnell Hall's series featuring Felton and the regular gang in Bakershaven, Connecticut, and if you've enjoyed any of Hall's previous novels you'll no doubt like this one.

This is a cozy with a slight edge: The violence is muted; the dialogue is pretty tame by crime novel standards; but Cora is a chain-smoking, foul-mouthed (compared to most cozy characters) old broad with an attitude. The fun is following along from one riotous chapter to the next, listening to the banter among the characters, getting lost in a comic misadventure that's light as air. If you enjoy that kind of thing -- and Hall is quite adept at carrying readers along on a wild ride with few hard bumps or crash landings -- this book is for you. You'll be able to ignore the implausible, hopelessly convoluted plot that exists solely to puzzle the reader. After finishing the book, I still wasn't sure what had happened -- but I didn't care all that much. Hall had entertained me for a few hours.

I had read the first in this series, "A Clue For the Puzzle Lady," and after reading this most recent entry, I'll go ahead and read the others. As a rule, I don't enjoy cozies. But Hall has a nice touch and a good sense of pacing, and this series provides a welcome change of pace for a reader who usually prefers a crime novel with a harder edge and bleaker vision.

One side note: A glaring error in the dust jacket copy has me wondering if the folks at Bantam even read the book. The copy twice refers to Bakersfield instead of Bakershaven.


Rating:
Summary: PUZZLELADY GOES MODERN
Review: I am still reading this book, but am really enjoying it. I have read all the other Puzzle lady books. I have enjoyed them all except the last one titled With This Puzzle, I Thee Kill. I especially like the way the auther wrote this story. I liked the way the Puzzle lady uses Google to find out information about people, which is very modern. He made some mentions about the Red Sox never winning the world series. If the author is reading this review, did you write the book before the Red Sox won the World Series? The publish date is November 2004, but I thought the author has to hand it to the publisher many months before that date. I am not sure.

I often chuckle when reading the Puzzle Lady stories. I think you will enjoy reading this book.

Rating:
Summary: deliciously convoluted amateur sleuth mystery
Review: She is known as the puzzle lady but it is really her publicity shy niece who is the puzzle constructor. Cora's favorite pastime is solving real life murder mysteries, which is why she agrees to lawyer Becky Baldwin's proposition. Becky wants Cora to find out if convicted murderer Daryl Daigue really killed seventeen year old Anita Dryer two decades ago. Depending on what Cora digs up, Becky will decide whether she wants to take the case.

Sara visits Darryl in prison; he acts like a criminal but insists that he was working at the time Anita was killed and he was covering for Ricky Gleason, the actual killer. Before leaving the prison, Warden Profack subtly warns Cora not to work on Darryl's case. Sara find that admonition suspicious and keeps digging which leads to her being followed by a private detective who is murdered at Cora's birthday party. Later, someone throws a rock through her window and she is arrested for absconding with a toy poodle that belongs to a woman who was also murdered because she had something that the killer wanted. The truth about who hired Becky and the two murders comes out when Cora has her day in court.

AND A PUZZLE TO DIE ON is a deliciously convoluted amateur sleuth mystery in which everyone connected to the case has a hidden agenda. The protagonist is in fine form as she breaks into offices and homes, steals what turn out to be significant, winds up spending a night in jail, and refuses to conform to court etiquette. Parnell Hall has written a complex who-done-it that has the requisite number of red herrings and misleading clues.

Harriet Klausner