A Conventional Corpse

An Arkansas bookseller must become a sleuth when death disrupts a local mystery convention in this "first-rate mystery" (Publishers Weekly).

Farberville, Arkansas, is playing host to its first-ever mystery convention with five major mystery writers—each representing a different subgenre of the mystery world—making the trek to the local college for "Murder Comes to Campus." Local bookseller Claire Malloy is looking forward to meeting some of her favorite writers and, of course, selling books to the attendees. But her plans for a calm, profitable weekend are soon laid to waste when the organizer is hospitalized, and Claire is dragooned into running the show.


Finding herself in the midst of barely controlled chaos, Claire must deal with five writers, each with a distinct set of idiosyncrasies and difficulties (including one who arrives with Wimple, her crime-solving cat, in tow). With Claire's own love-life woes with local police detective Peter Rosen added in, things have never been worse . . . until things get worse. One of the conference attendees dies in a car accident, Wimple the cat disappears from Claire's home, and Roxanne Small is nowhere to be found—making it evident that in Farberville the murder mystery is more than a literary genre.

"First-rate Hess: crackling dialogue, winning characters, and an ingenious puzzle." —Kirkus Reviews