Sunday, June 6, 2010

Sketch Me If You Can-Sharon Pape

Sketch Me If You Can
Sharon Pape
Berkley, Aug 3 2010, $7.99
ISBN: 9780425236048

Nobody is more distressed and heartbroken than Rory McCain is when her favorite Uncle Mac died from what apparently was a massive coronary. Mac leaves his entire estate that includes a Victorian home, his private eye business and his luxurious car to his beloved niece. As a police sketch artist, Rory is not allowed to moonlight so she begins to close down his business starting with informing Jeremy Logan whom she cannot reach when he walks in asking for Mac.

When he learns Mac is dead, he hires Rory to look into the death of his sister Gail. It was ruled an accident but he believes it was murder. To get around the police ban on moonlighting, Rory refuses to charge him a fee. She moves into her new home where she meets permanent resident the ghost Federal Marshall Ezekiel “Zeke” Drummond, who was killed in the 1870s while hunting a serial killer who murdered little girls. He explains he helped Mac and offers a similar partnership with Rory; her consideration being to investigate his cold case of whom murdered him. Although she explains to the ghost his case is Arctic frozen, he understands and she agrees to their teaming. They soon learn Gail had several enemies with motives and opportunities, but someone stalks Rory in case she gets too close to naming the culprit.

This entertaining paranormal cozy stars a feisty heroine who copes with the death of a loved one, a ghost in residence when she thought spirits were something either in wine or a Ghostbuster movie, and a case with too many suspects. The fun in this lighthearted frolic is figuring out who the killer is before the heroine and her poltergeist partner do. Readers will admire and adore the intrepid heroine as she risks her life to uncover the identity of Gail’s killer.

Harriet Klausner

No comments: