Harper Paperbooks; ISNB 0-06-109585-0
Does a cold-blooded killer, who escaped justice on a technicality, deserve help and protection when she's in trouble? That's the problem facing private investigator Callahan Garrity in Kathy Hogan Trocheck's 1997 mystery Heart Trouble. 

Attorney Zack Alexander may have gotten his client, drunk driver Whitney Albright Dobbs, off after killing second grader, Faneeta Mayes, but that's not the end of Whitney's problems. Whitney's cardiologist husband wants a divorce, which wouldn't be so bad, but the doctor claims he's broke -- can't even pay his daughter's school fees. 

Where did the money go? Zack hires an investigator, but Whitney can't stand him. So Zack asks Callahan to take the case. 

At first, Callahan won't help Whitney. Since human justice failed, Callahan believes Whitney deserves whatever cosmic justice fate chooses to hand out. But Callahan's mom, Edna, and some of the staff of House Mouse (Callahan's house cleaning business) disagree. Without forgiving Whitney, they feel that Callahan should help. 

Trocheck cleverly uses the engaging House Mouse staff to pull readers and the book's other characters seamlessly into the story. Trocheck's also a master at unfolding a mystery in the most exciting manner possible -- no mean trick in genre defined as "cozy." Trocheck's skill makes the Callahan Garrity series a real find.  

Other books in the Callahan Garrity series include Midnight Clear (Trocheck's most recent Callahan mystery), Strange Brew, To Live & Die in Dixie and Happy Never After..  

Suzanne Frisbee

Click here to share your views.