Poisoned Pins

Claire Malloy, bookstore owner, part-time sleuth, and full-time single mother, is not quite ready to face her big 4-0 birthday, but her gray hair is getting a boost from the melodramatic antics of her fifteen-year-old daughter Caron - and the screaming that comes from the sorority house next door. Strange things are definitely happening at Kappa Theta Eta House, things that don’t seem to match its girlish pink-and-frilly facade or sappy, sentimental traditions. To further complicate Claire’s life, a relentlessly optimistic sorority girl has recruited Caron to be a My Beautiful Self, Inc., consultant. It seems like an innocent enough way to earn some extra cash - until one sister is killed in the dark alley behind the sorority. The cops say accidental hit-and-run, but Claire, more than willing to be diverted from the recession that has hit both her bookstore and her love life, isn’t so sure. The intrepid Claire digs deeper into the case, but little does she know that soon she will see the world from the back of a Harley Davidson motorcycle ... or be arrested in a raid at the Dew Drop Inn ... or rub elbows (and, God forbid, maybe more) with the night manager of the sleaziest motel in town. And little does she suspect that the secrets of the sugar-and-spice sorority sisters of the Delta Delta chapter of Kappa Theta Eta are more blue than pink - and are about to turn a deadly blood red.

JOAN HESS is the author of both the Claire Malloy and the Maggody mystery series. She is a winner of the American Mystery Award, a member of Sisters in Crime, and a former president of the American Crime Writers League. She lives in Fayetteville, Arkansas.