Soap Bubbles

In their early thirties, wannabe actresses and BFFs Delly Diamond, Anissa Cartier, and Maryl Bradley have roles on the Morning Star soap opera. However, even though they have come a long way from Blood, Sweat and Tears of the 1960s and 1970s, each knows they have a long way to go if they are to make it and if their respective traumatic childhoods in Queens don't hold them back. Things turn ugly between the friends when Delly is fired. Soon after being canned, a fire causes production of the soap to shut down. The police suspect Delly as the arsonist as she had the motive and opportunity. She and her two buddies investigate hoping to prove otherwise. This is an enjoyable tale that brings to life three decades, but the book never decides whether it is an amateur sleuth or a character study. When the subplot focuses on the mid 1980s, the three BFFs try to prove Delly is innocent in an entertaining investigation; when the subplot goes back to their childhood, the tale spins into a character study as each struggle with a nasty situation. Still the child is the adult and as such fans will enjoy Soap Bubbles, a homage to when the soaps were kings of daytime TV. Harriet Klausner