Boat Dollies (Sally Malone Mysteries)

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Summary: HOLLAND OPENS A DOOR INTO A NEW WORLD--HER WORLD!
Review: After reading BOAT DOLLIES, I wasn't surprised to learn that Holland had experienced this life. No one could write with this authority and sure hand if they hadn't had the experience. The characters were real people, the plot refreshing and different, and the mystery well-handled. This was a really enjoyable book--the first of what I hope will be many from Ms. Holland.

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Summary: Entertaining and informative
Review: Boat Dollies is an entertaining and informative mystery that plays out on a Caribbean island. Sally and Peter Malone arrive at the island on their sailing yacht, pulling into the darkened anchorage almost in time to witness the murder. The next morning, the victim is found floating offshore, dead from stab wounds. Her name was Rita and she was a "boat dollie" between positions. We quickly learn the meaning of this term. There are those who own sailing yachts. Some are independently wealthy and others make a living by hiring them out for charter. And there are those who don't own a yacht but enjoy the nautical lifestyle, and are able to live it by making themselves useful. It isn't exactly a job and it isn't exactly marriage, either. The arrangements are flexible or liquid.

Joyce Holland knows the Caribbean sailing scene and brings it to life before our eyes. Sally Malone is a semi-reluctant amateur sleuth. Husband Peter keeps telling her to not get involved. But the anchorage and shore makes for a small community, and not being curious would take special effort. The reader will be pulled in by the couple's social interactions with their nearest neighbors in the anchorage. The community's social center is the bar were boat people and locals can get together on equal footing, providing they can pay for the drinks. Joyce Holland escorts us through the door to witness sexual barter and sexual politics if we are bright enough to recognize it when we see it. She introduces us to a paradise where some people have lots of free time but not much money, and shows us some for whom it is the other way around. She introduces us to Islanders, beach bums, a hermit living on a nearby island, and to flown-in tourists who crawl over the island and sometimes put down money for sailboat charters.

Observant Sally gets in deeply when she comes into possession of Rita's diary. And then her efforts to be kind to Rita's family mark her as a threat to the killer. Like a descent into a maelstrom, the story takes its logical course leading to stalking and an exciting chase scene.

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Summary: Thoughtful Island Mystery That Holds the Reader
Review: Boat Dollies, Holland's first novel in print has an honesty and maturity about it. At last, a female protagonist who isn't always joking or sarcastic. No, indeed, Sally Malone is middle-aged, intelligent, and thoughtful. She and her husband Peter have just sailed into a small Caribbean Island harbor. The two are on an extended cruise, having recently lost their daughter in an accident. Sally's raw grief makes her vulnerable to the woes of the young women at the marina, the boat dollies, who will stay with any guy to keep on sailing.

Reverberations of her loss and a need to engross herself in someone else's business for a while are reason enough for Sally to dig into the murder of the boat dolly named Rita. Also, Sally is certain that she saw something that night; she's not sure what, but some clue is on the tip of her memory. In the meantime, a thug has been hired to chase Sally away from her quest and harm might well befall her.

The plot isn't reminiscent of anything I've read previously, nor are the well-articulated characters. I like this one for being both fresh and unpretentious. The entertainment doesn't lie in the heroine's antics (unlike many mysteries out now). Holland's focus on the murder is strong, but, at the same time, there is a vivid setting of the scene and examination of its cast. (I wish more of the male characters' names could have started with a letter other than `J', however--but this is only an aging-brain quibble.)

Holland, a winner last year of a Derringer short-story award, comes by her knowledge of the boaters' world legitimately. She lives on a houseboat. Having the atmosphere right doesn't mean that someone can convey it to a readership, however, Yet, Holland is quite skillfully capable of that. She's good. This is the second Deadly Alibi book I've read. (The first was The Adventures of the Second Mrs. Watson by Michael Mallory.) All I can say is--with choices so well-made, DAP (if I may call it that),a brand-new press, has hitting its stride with its first releases.

Who killed Rita? Let Holland tell you.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent Sailing mystery
Review: Boat Dollies, of the title, is a derogatory term applied to a bevy of young, usually
free-spirited, women, who hang around various good-weather sailing meccas. You can
usually find them in the Caribbean, along the Mediterranean, and in some Australian
ports. They hire themselves out as crew to passing yacht skippers. They are frequently
good sailors and they'll clean, hand the boat, cook and do other general work. Some of
the women are working their way around the world, others are traveling cheaply to
particular destinations. Some are runaways and most are ordinary citizens who have
chosen this itinerant sailing world as their life style, at least for a while. Unfortunately,
drugs, unwanted sex, alcoholism and other worldly ills may become part of the picture.
In the sailing world are boat owners, charterers, and those called-live-aboards, people
who for a variety of reasons, have left their lives ashore for the world of the sea, of the
wind, the waves, the storms and the calms. Author Joyce Holland has mined this world
well, a world she obviously has carefully researched, to pen this finely-crafted story of
murder and intrigue in the Caribbean.
Sally and Peter Malone, a married live-aboard coupe have sailed into a marina on the
shore of a Caribbean island. Fleeing their troubled life ashore, they find themselves
emeshed in the mystery surrounding the murder of a boat dolly named Rita. Rita, it turns
out, has left a diary. Finding and reading the diary, in the hopes of learning who
murdered the girl, becomes a main focus of the novel..
The descriptions of life in the marina and on the beach are tempting, accurate and for the
most part compelling. Author Holland weaves a good story with a satisfying crop of
tension filled scenes and if the book is a bit episodic, if you are interested in mystery
fiction, sailing, and a good look inside an exotic and intriguing world, Boat Dollies is a
rewarding mystery.

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Summary: New twist on mysteries!
Review: I think it was the title that first caught my interest on this book. Had no idea what a "boat dollie" was but it sounded interesting. Ms. Holland blew me away! I had no idea what a world would open up to me. The author does a terrific job of educating, entertaining, and intriguing her reader all at once. I was tired of so many mysteries seeming to be the same old thing, but she really puts a twist on mysteries with her unusual setting and unforgettable characters. Oh, and I also liked that this book appeals to the over-30 crowd. I get so tired of reading shallow twenty-somethings.

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Summary: Take a Mystery Cruise to the Tropics
Review: Joyce Holland artfully draws us into the world of boat people. The tropical setting resonates to the beat of steel drums as Sally Malone, otherwise known as Boat Mama, seeks the answers to a young girl's grisly death. In the process she encounters some of the most colorful characters ever to set sail, any one of whom could be the killer, and unwittingly makes herself the next target for murder. High winds, soft sands, intrigue and romance flow through the twisting plot like island rum as Sally closes in on the murderer...and he closes in on her. Grab a pina colada, settle into your hammock and immerse yourself in the world of Boat Dollies. A most enjoyable read.

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Summary: Novel unsure of what it's supposed to be
Review: This book tries to succeed on too many fronts:

1. Soulful introspection about the loss of a loved one
2. Insight into liveaboard life
3. Story about the Islands
4. Murder mystery

There are few novels that could pull all this off successfully, let alone in 200 pages.

My girlfriend handed this one off to me, we're both avid sailors and I have spent time in the Carribbean. Joyce Holland tried to accomplish way too much, compromising the characters, the plot, the facts about sailing/cruising/liveaboards. Also, the typeset in the book makes me dizzy, subtly different fonts and sizes. Yuck.