|
|
|
CATEGORIES
AUTHORS
Habu Stephen Bush OTHER IMPRINTS
Memberof The Australian Publishers Association Member of
|
Murder Mystery, Romance, Lesbian
E-BOOK RRP US$2.99
PRINT BOOK US$7.95
BLURB: When Charlotte Diamond retired to Diamond Cottage near Maryland’s eastern shore of the Chesapeake Bay, she thought she had left her life of crime—solving it, that is—behind her, and is struggling to find a new purpose in life. But the small waterfront community of Hopewell on the Choptank, with its wealthy artistically inclined inhabitants, is hiding old crimes and dark secrets beneath its outward quiet and affluence. A surprising number of people from the community have intersecting pasts and dark secrets that Charlotte is unaware of and that become downright murderous, coming to a head when blockbuster movie actress, Brenda Brandon, arrives in the village in full retreat from a recent tragedy in her life. And Sam, the neglected husky who has attached himself to Charlotte, knows more about what is going on than he can tell her, even with his howling. EXTRACT: She
could see, though, when she opened the front door, that it would be a while
before she’d be able to read the Sun—and that she’d have to read it
outside—because she discovered a wet and muddy-pawed Sam curled up on top of
it in the center of the brick walk from the street to her door. The local paper
was nowhere to be found, which wasn’t all that surprising, as delivery times
for that were erratic. “Where
have you been, Sam?” Charlotte asked, as he lifted his head dreamily, fighting
to raise himself up from sleep and gave her a loving smile. “And what have you
got around your neck?” Charlotte
leaned down to find that Sam was attached to his leash still. Charlotte thought
this was strange—not just that a dog Susan had let run free was wearing a
leash, but also that if she’d taken him out on the leash, why had she left it
on him? Charlotte didn’t want to criticize as it was an indication that Susan
was trying to do the right thing—but leaving him out with a leash on his neck?
Really. He could snag it on something and choke himself. Charlotte
took one end of the leash, and Sam raised up and followed her—quite
willingly—as, in her robe and slippers, she marched across the still-wet grass
between her cottage and the Wells’ house and rapped on the front door. She was
in the mood to give Susan a dressing down for her neglect of the dog and was
fully prepared to tell her that she was going to report the treatment to the
Wellses, even if they were in Turkey and not really able to do much about
it—and she intended to carry through with the threat, if need be. But
there was no answer to her knocking. And there was no answer either when
Charlotte moved around to the back door. Being who she was—and not the least
because she was tall enough to look inside them, Charlotte went around the walls
of the house to look into the interior through the windows that weren’t
covered with curtains—but there was no sign of Susan inside.
|
