Amateur Night
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- $9.99
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
It's been a long time since she solved her first "hopeless case" and Jane da Silva is running out of money. Her Uncle Harold's bizarre will provides her with a handsome income if she successfully runs his Foundation for Righting Wrongs and pleases its crusty old board of directors.
Through Calvin Mason, the young attorney who befriends her, she finds a new hopeless case. A real hopeless case. Kevin Shea is a teenage drug addict convicted of holding up a pharmacy and killing the druggist's wife. Kevin is such a low-life even his mother is convinced he's guilty and glad he's behind bars.
Now it appears there was a witness to the murders, a young woman whose prescription was being filled at the time of the murder. The witness might be able to prove that Kevin is innocent of the murder. Jane learns that four women with the same name all live in remote areas of Vancouver Island, one of them the missing witness. There's someone else who wants to find the missing witness too, someone who isn't afraid to turn to murder when Jane gets too close for comfort. Jane's breath-taking and dangerous romp through the northern wilderness leads her to the Tip Top Club, a stripper bar, where she faces down the clever killer and wraps up a satisfactory hopeless case, proving that everyone deserves justice.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Jane da Silva, ``a kind of nonprofit detective'' in Seattle, returns in a delightful follow-up to A Hopeless Case . In order to inherit her Uncle Harold's money, now held by the trustees of his Foundation for Righting Wrongs, Jane has to solve another ``hopeless case'' (the trustees ``bounced her first effort on a technicality''). The conviction of Kevin Shea appears to fit the bill. As Jane's lawyer-pal Calvin Mason tells her, Kevin was found guilty of killing Betty Cox in the pharmacy she ran in downtown Seattle; his delinquent past convinced everyone he was guilty. But now one of the jurors remembers seeing a magazine on the floor in one of the crime-scene photos, suggesting there may have been a witness who fled after the murder. Then Jane stumbles on the body of Jennifer Gilbert, whose prescription Mrs. Cox was typing when she was shot; the second death lends more plausibility to Kevin's innocence. While tracking Jennifer's roommate, Jane discovers she isn't alone in her search; when her tires are slashed twice, she realizes the killer is on her trail. A likable heroine and gripping suspense laced with humor distinguish this enjoyable mystery. ( July )
