Monday, February 27, 2012

TRIPLE SHOT by Sandra Balzo

Our narrator is Maggy, who co-owns a coffee shop with Sarah.  Two real estate agents have been murdered in this small town in Wisconsin, and Sarah doubles as a realtor.  When her intern Brigid turns up dead also, the terror has hit a little too close to home, especially since her body is found in a room under the coffee shop.  However, no one seems all that terrorized.  The tennis ladies still show up for lunch, even with crime tape on the premises, and Maggy does some amateur sleuthing at a bar where Brigid was last seen.  I guessed the culprit as soon as the fourth victim was identified in a resident's swimming pool, and so will you.  Maggy is sleeping with the handsome sheriff, but neither of them grasps the obvious.  Since the plot needed some outsiders to provide a decoy, there's a TV crew in town to film the expected recovery of some missing millions that the local Mafiosi skimmed from casino loot.  The show's star is Ward Chitown, from Chicago—where else?  He's slimy and greedy but too new in town to finger for the murders.  Plus, he has no motive.  Or does he?   I just found the whole situation too implausible, including the murders themselves and the town's nonchalant reaction, and I can handle an implausible plot if it's funny or entertaining or suspenseful, and this book just didn't have enough of these attributes.

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