Sleaze

A libertine expat translator wakes up to discover her (married) one-night stand dead and is subsequently blackmailed into investigating his untimely demise.

Mari—a raffish freelancer with a penchant for martinis, gossip, and men of less than sterling character—has a problem. Jean-Michel, her fling from the previous night, didn't wake up in the morning. And when his femme fatale widow comes knocking, insisting her no-good husband was murdered, Mari finds herself pressed into the role of reluctant gumshoe. 

With the help of her friends, fellow émigrés and inveterate reprobates, Mari begins a desultory dive into Jean-Michel's recent—shady—dealings. As Mari warms to her new character of amateur sleuth, she stumbles upon a sinister conspiracy involving an exclusive wellness retreat, guerrilla activists, and a narcotics sting.

Meanwhile, the Mediterranean city where Mari lives is electrified by an escalating series of politically charged kidnappings. And as this web of power, influence, and collusion grows even more tangled, Mari is forced to reckon with her long-buried feelings for her best friend, who might be more tied up in the Jean-Michel affair than he'd like to admit. Through Mari’s dissolute, gimlet-eyed gaze, Francesca Reece delivers an irrepressible, hilarious, virtuosic homage to the classic caper.