St. Martin’s Minotaur (Hardcover), ISBN 0312242344
Dido Hoare -- antiquarian bookseller in London, thirtyish single mom -- seems to attract trouble more easily than a Hollywood movie actress attracts paparazzi. Struggling to make ends meet in the not-always-lucrative world of rare books, raising her toddler son and keeping track of her nosy parker father, Dido often juggles a punishing schedule. Lucky for her, hiring Phyllis Digby as nanny for young Ben answered her prayers. Or so she thought, until a middle-of-the-night phone call rips Dido from a sound sleep and sends her racing to Phyllis’s flat to rescue her erstwhile rock-solid nanny. The nearly incoherent call intimates danger of an unknown kind.

Fearing the worst, Dido arrives at the Digbys’ house to find Phyllis locked in a closet, her husband out of town and his office tossed over as if by a tornado. The situation gets even stranger when two men, supposedly detectives, show up at the flat the next morning -- even after Phyllis refuses to notify the police. After Dido contacts Detective Inspector Paul Grant, the two men quickly leave, but not before Phyllis recognizes one of them as one of the burglars from the previous night.

Frank Digby, Phyllis’s husband works as a freelance accountant, but Paul warns Dido that Digby’s reputation precedes him. Evidently, Frank served jail time in the past, and said past seems to be catching up with him. When Phyllis receives a strange card ostensibly from her husband, Dido and Phyllis realize that he probably means to stay away. Since Dido’s curiosity demands satisfaction, she decides to investigate -- against the advice of her friend Paul and involving both her father and Phyllis in an increasingly dangerous situation that could threaten their very lives.

Marianne Macdonald pens another hit with Road Kill. The fourth Dido Hoare mystery maintains the high standards evident in each of her previous novels. With well-realized characters and a knack for spinning a yarn, Macdonald weaves a complex, skillful tale that totally absorbed me from page one. Secondary characters ring true, while her primary characters continue to evolve and grow with each book.

But if you only read paperbacks, don’t wait for Road Kill‘s rerelease. If you haven’t already begun the series, pick up a copy of Death’s Autograph, Ghost Walk and Smoke Screen, and don’t stop until you read them all.

Maria Y. Lima

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