Sugar on the Bones
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4.0 • 2 Ratings
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- $19.99
Publisher Description
In this holy mess of a case for the "perpetual bad boy" (New York Times) sleuths in the beloved Hap and Leonard series, PI Duo Hap and Leonard investigate the untimely death of a woman whose family stood much to gain from her passing.
Minnie Polson is dead. Burned to a crisp in a fire so big and bad it had to be deliberate. The only thing worse is that Hap and Leonard could have prevented it. Maybe. Minnie had a feeling she was being targeted, shaken down by some shadowy force. However, when she’d solicited Hap & Leonard, all it took was one off color joke to turn her sour and she’d called them off the investigation. Wracked with a guilty conscience, the two PIs—along with Hap’s fleet-footed wife, Brett—tuck in to the case. As they look closer, they dredge up troublesome facts: for one, Minnie’s daughter, Alice, has recently vanished. She’d been hard up after her pet grooming business went under and was in line to collect a whopping insurance sum should anything happen to her mother. The same was due to Minnie’s estranged husband, Al, whose kryptonite (beautiful, money-grubbing women) had left him with only a run-down mobile home. But did Minnie’s foolish, cash-strapped family really have it in them to commit a crime this grisly? Or is there a larger, far more sinister scheme at work?
Irreverent, wise-cracking, and full of atmosphere and bite, Sugar on the Bones is not to be missed.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Edgar winner Lansdale excels in his savagely funny 13th case for East Texas PIs Hap Collins and Leonard Pine (after The Elephant of Surprise). When Minnie Polson consults with Hap and his wife, Brett, about the blackmail she's been subject to, the duo's off-color jokes dissuade her from hiring them. Hap brushes off the encounter, but when Minnie dies in a suspicious house fire, he and Brett feel compelled to investigate. With Leonard's help, they turn up evidence of a complicated insurance money scheme, with suspects including Minnie's missing daughter, Alice, and Minnie's estranged husband, Al, who left her for a gold-digging stripper named Earline. As the detectives tease out the motivations of each of Minnie's relatives, they run afoul of a ruthless crime ring and have little choice but to employ the services of mercenaries Vanilla and Jim Bob. Blood-splattered action and a welcome spoonful of irreverent humor make this a surefire hit. It's a high-water mark for the series.
