Life shouldn’t imitate art for a mystery writer. Gritty glamour in 1980s New York City doesn’t come cheap. To afford even her fifth-floor walkup, Rose Leary needs a gig. Bartending at a neighborhood joint subsidizes her writing career, even if she does fill a dead woman’s platforms. While she wonders who killed her predecessor, a looming deadline demands Rose abandon all distractions to concentrate on finishing her own mystery. Someone slaughters another woman at Rose’s job, and Rose starts to picture her name scrawled next on the murderer’s hit list. Frightening phone calls and ominous gifts turn everyone she meets into a suspect. Dead flowers dirty her hallway, and her phone shrills menace. Rose spurns the protection offered by Frank Butler, the maddening detective assigned to the case. She wants information, not useless lectures on safety. Terror invades her life as Rose struggles to expose the killer in a desperate race to save herself and her work. Set in the West Village restaurant scene, Bartender Wanted resurrects a city where fishmongers and greengrocers filled the stores now colonized by boutiques, and where brawny butchers gave the Meatpacking District its name. *** Bartender Wanted introduces the Rose Leary series, tales of chilling suspense and cold-blooded murder set in 1980s Greenwich Village. Written with wit, intelligence, and a distinctive style, these mysteries offer readers an intoxicating signature cocktail.