Murder Takes the Cake

I very much enjoyed Evelyn David's second installment of the Sullivan mysteries. Any bride or mother-of-the-bride can identify with the trials and tribulations of planning the wedding for Brigit and Joshua. However the family complications prove to be more than imagined. The tug and pull between Rachel and Mac again enchants. The twists and turns of the plot keep the reader engaged throughout. A good read.

The second in the Sullivan Investigation series continues the story of Mac, the investigator, with a dog as a sidekick--no dog lover should resist. The plot is fast-paced and complex but entirely understandable. Rachel, who does makeup on bodies being prepped by a funeral home, won my heart when she was in a tight jam and was wondering who could ever find their pepper spray at the bottom of their purse... Lots of laughs amidst the mayhem.

Another fast-paced, fun-to-read, whodunit by Evelyn David. As if an impending wedding between private investigator Mac Sullivan's goddaughter (newspaper reporter Bridget O'Herlihy) and Joshua Lasky, a guy from an uppity New England socialite family isn't enough to keep the book's whacky characters busy, how about tossing in a few corpses, and a rollicking ride inside a casket through the halls of a tired mortuary in search of a killer. And that's just for starters! The cast of characters (human and otherwise) is vast, diverse, and except for Whiskey the Irish wolfhound and a newly introduced feline named Snickers, quite unpredictable. It might take a chapter or two to catch up with the pace of the book, but once there, stretch out, tune in, and hang on.

Murder Takes the Cake Evelyn David Echelon, May 1 2009, $13.99 ISBN: 1590806182 One week before Thanksgiving DC private investigator Mac Sullivan, a loner except for Whiskey the dog, finds his world upside down since Sullivan and Company has "grown". First, his business is in trouble needing paying customers not just bartering clients. Second, his assistant twenty-two years old Juliana "JJ" Jarrett and his elderly ailing researcher Edger are driving him crazy. Finally there is divorcee single mom Rachel Brenner who works at a funeral home and whom he is attracted to and believes she reciprocates his feelings, but he has no idea how to act on a date. Now his about to marry goddaughter, Boston reporter Bridget O'Herlihy, visits him asking for his help as she swears someone is trying to kill her. Although he doubts this is the case, he takes the threat seriously and sends his team out on assignments. Soon the corpses pile up while the groom and his family insist she is being a drama queen; at a time her dad Jeff wonders who stole caskets from his funeral home. Mac, JJ, Edger, Rachel and Whiskey keep digging looking for the ties that bound everyone involved. The second Murder Takes (see MURDER OFF THE BOOKS) is an amusing cozy starring an ensemble cast of eccentrics. The story line is fast-paced while containing two mysteries tied to death (corpses and coffins are like peanut butter and jelly), a maybe romance, enemy canine-feline, an out of control wedding plan, and junk cars. The characters make for a fun lighthearted frolic as Evelyn David proves in deed MURDER TAKES THE CAKE. Harriet Klausner

Evelyn David is actually a partnership between Marian Edelman Borden and Rhonda Dossett. Marian is an author of ten non-fiction books and hails from New York. Rhonda lives in Oklahoma and is the coal administrator for the state. The most interesting facet of their relationship is that they have never met in person. MURDER TAKES THE CAKE is the follow-up to their first effort, MURDER OFF THE BOOKS. Both books feature Whiskey, an Irish wolfhound. Rachel Brenner leads an interesting life. After her divorce from a meandering husband, she landed a job in a funeral home. Mac Sullivan runs a private detective agency. What do they have in common? Rachel and Mac have an uneasy relationship bound by their past experiences. But after Rachel discovers the inventory at the funeral home doesn't jibe with their invoices, she inveigles Mac to look into the problem. Hilariously, the skittish Mac thinks she's trying to pin him down regarding their relationship: "'What?' Mac was confused. Somehow he'd misread the whole situation. Maybe she wasn't breaking up with him. Can you even break up with someone you really haven't dated yet? 'The missing caskets? Did Jeff already tell you about them? There's about $20,000 worth that we can't find. Jeff is talking about running some kind of sting operation to catch the thieves.'" Tales about mid-life detectives scream out for laughter, and the Evelyn David team complies with aplomb. They add a wedding between Mac's goddaughter and a spoiled little rich kid who has the sensitivity of a hockey puck to keep the plot lively. Characters abound, from the endearing Rachel and Mac to the confused teenager who is brought into line by Mac's office manager, JJ. Whiskey, Mac's Irish wolfhound and Snickers, Rachel's cat, also fit into the mix and promise to have many future exploits. MURDER TAKES THE CAKE is light-hearted fun, with a little mystery; a little romance; a little family dysfunction; and several out-of-the-ordinary adventures thrown in to make it a fun-filled whodunit. It's worth reading just to sort out all the characters. Shelley Glodowski Senior Reviewer