Scandal in Fair Haven

Scandal in Fair Haven

In her last tantalizing mystery, Dead Man's Island, award-winning author Carolyn G. Hart gave us a colorful new heroine, seasoned ex-journalist turned sleuth Henrietta O'Dwyer Collins. Now Henrie O is back...this time investigating a brutal murder in a lovely southern town where wealth and privilege mask a hotbed of lies, sex, and deadly desperation.... Henrie O is looking forward to a peaceful holiday at her friend Margaret's Tennessee mountain cabin. But Henrie O awakens to find Margaret's nephew, his shirt stained with blood, his handsome face stricken by fear and horror.... Craig Matthews swears he didn't kill his wife, swears he didn't lure Patty Kay out to the playhouse on their lavish Fair Haven estate and leave her bloodied and dead. Why, then, did he run away? It's a question the authorities want answered, and when Craig cannot explain away the evidence found at the crime scene or the suspicion that he'd married - and now murdered - for money, Henrie O finds herself drawn into the thick of a life-and-death drama among the privileged residents of Fair Haven. For Margaret's sake she agrees to pursue the investigation and finds that as Craig's "aunt" she has instant entree into Fair Haven's best families. But the more Henrie O becomes privy to their deepest fears and most intimate secrets, the more she begins to question their motives. How had they really felt about Patty Kay Prentiss Matthews, a warm, vibrant woman whose forceful personality meant she'd always gotten her way? In this outwardly idyllic town, it seems there are many with reason to feel threatened: not only the widower, who claims he's a hapless victim in a cleverly devised frame-up, but Patty Kay's sullen nymphet of a daughter whose transparent love for her stepfather is anything but innocent; Patty Kay's irresistible ex-husband, who may never have released her; the dead woman's venomous, grasping sister; and even the ingratiating headmaster of the exclusive school where Patty Kay was a trustee. And just when Henrie O feels she's closing in on the truth, another corpse is uncovered - and Henrie O knows time is running out. Now she must play her hunches to untangle this deadly web before she, too, becomes a victim of a mind bent on murder. Hart's engaging armchair detective leaves her couch long enough to investigate a murder in an affluent community. Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. For readers who want the American equivalent of a British cozy with just a tad more spice, Hart is a real find. (Not that she doesn't already have a devoted audience--her books have won three major mystery awards.) Like Christie's Miss Marple mysteries, Hart's stories look at the feelings, emotions, and passions of real-life people in real-life situations. Hart's heroine, Henrietta O'Dwyer Collins ("Henrie O" to her friends) is a sixtysomething retired journalist-turned-sleuth with the gentle wisdom of Miss Marple and the sharp-witted exuberance of television's Jessica Fletcher. Henrie O's latest adventure takes her to Fair Haven, Tennessee, where a local bookstore owner is accused of murdering his wealthy wife. Even though it looks like an open-and-shut case, Henrie O's detecting instincts tell her something's fishy in Fair Haven. Hart offers a light and lively read with an appealing "small-town America" ambience, a compelling plot, a potpourri of fascinating characters, and some revealing insights into what makes us humans tick. Emily Melton Just because Henrietta O'Dwyer Collins (Dead Man's Island, 1993) has retired from reporting the news doesn't mean she's retired from asking nosy questions; and when Craig Matthews stumbles into the Tennessee vacation cottage she was to share with his stricken aunt gasping that he didn't kill his socialite wife, Patty Kay, she swiftly assumes the role of his aunt and takes up his cause. The deck is stacked against Craig--somebody went to a lot of trouble to lure him home to discover Patty Kay's body--but Henrie O, alertly noticing that there are no footprints in the cheesecake (don't ask), is sure that he's innocent and turns instead to the town's secrets, heralded by the incessant sniping of Fair Havenites. After pausing to note the obligatory adulteries- -both Craig and Patty Kay were not only having active affairs but were worshiped from afar--Henrie O focuses on the links among Patty Kay's death, the suicide of Walden School student Franci Hollis a day earlier, and the murder of a bookstore clerk who maybe remembered too much about the phone call that lured Craig back home. As before, serenely self-confident Henrie O proves a paragon of sturdy, old-fashioned detection. On the evidence here, Fair Haven must be the busiest, nastiest little hamlet in the galaxy. -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.