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Books
by T. Dawn
Richard
Death
for Dessert
Riotous mildly hard-boiled mystery!
Death
for Dessert offers an
unusual and
unexpected sleuth for the setting who turns the senior citizen
residence upside down. The mysteries carefully unfold, not truly solved
to the end. The slightly twisted humor and sleuth carries the reader
through the pages at a quick clip.
May List's
cheating doctor husband has gone one step too far.
Although raised to be proper, she is one senior citizen whose husband
is not going to leave her for some young Bambi and kill her spirit. She
dumps sugar in his gas tank, checks herself into a senior citizen's
home and watch out! She's just getting started.
All the residents
seem to avoid the strange Mrs. Berkowitz who
lives next to her, but not May List, at least not until she turns up
dead. But wait, what are those crumbs on he corpse's lips? Weren't
those the brownies that she had given Mrs. Berkowitz to bribe
information out of her? May List must prove her innocence before the
corpse is discovered. How can such a proper lady cause such a ruckus?
One hilarious escapade after another ensues.
As a character and
sleuth, May List certainly stands apart from
Miss Marple, Jessica Fletcher and other mild senior citizens. Except
for absence of the violence and explicit sex typical of the genre, this
mystery borders on the hard-boiled. The writing style is intentionally
a bit coarse and the sleuth's sees her world with a perspective
dynamically askew from the stereotypical elderly sleuth.
Once or twice the
literary jokes fall slightly flat but not often.
Otherwise, the language lay stimulates and amuses, such as when the
author turns "Lord of the Dance" into "Lord Help Us of the Dance" in a
particularly suspenseful crazy predicament. I thoroughly enjoyed this
book and would like to read more by this author. I found this a very
refreshing change from the typical tame mystery.
Digging Up Otis
A humorous,
action-packed addition to the May List mystery repertoire!
T. Dawn
Richard's DIGGING UP OTIS is an unusual mystery with an unusual
sleuth. Several twists, action scenes and a surprise twist at the end
keep this mystery exciting. Humor and an unusual geriatric commando
unit with walkers and Depends and other ailments will go above and
beyond to discover and capture the culprit.
May List, the
sleuth from T. Dawn Richard's previous mystery DEATH
FOR DESSERT has settled into a comfortable life after solving her last
mystery at the Waning Years Estate. She missed the residents after the
recent changes in her life. Giving her cat a shower and getting clawed
in the process is not substitute for solving crimes. When she receives
a call from one of her friends from the nursing home, she is only too
ready to return. A man named Otis has gone missing and the residents
are certain he has been murdered. May and her geriatric commando force
will do anything to unearth the culprit even if it means digging up a
corpse in the grave to take his fingerprints.
Ever since she
solved discovered her first corpse in DEATH FOR
DESSERT and solved the crime, May List has been fantasizing about
solving more crimes. The author breaks the expected mystery formula by
including forbidden actions and topics to heighten the humor. Going to
a cemetery and digging up a buried corpse is certainly not accepted
practice. The author makes this mystery a humorous reading journey
through her characters and their mention of items not too typical in a
cozy mystery like Depends, flatulence and putting underwear on
backwards.
Readers who
loved DEATH FOR DESSERT will love this next
installment. Many of the characters are familiar as well as the
location. Although this book can be read as a stand alone, it is best
enjoyed after reading DEATH FOR DESSERT since some of the details in
May List's life happened due to her first case. Readers will find May
List not the typical elderly sleuth for sure and nice variety in the my
mystery reads: Irreverent in some ways, slightly hard-boiled in a
geriatric not in the sexual side rather defines the hard-boiled genre,
definitely some unexpected twists at the end, and lots of action scenes
too.
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Merrimon
Book Reviews