2011; 310 pages. Book 3 (out of 5) of the “Dead Red Mystery” series. New Author? : No. Genre : Crime Mystery; Women Sleuths; Cozy. Overall Rating : 7*/10.
It certainly wasn’t the best party Lalla Bains
had ever attended.
The first downer was the theme of it: a going-out-of-business
get-together. The family crop-dusting
company that Lalla and her father have managed for years was to be sold at the
end of the spraying season, and that wraps up next week sometime.
The second downer was that Aunt Mae and Cousin Pearlie flew in from Texas for Lalla’s upcoming
wedding, and were at the party as well.
Lalla’s dad refers to Aunt Mae as “that old bat”, and Cousin Pearlie
is not above hitting on any eligible and hunky man for the possibility of
matrimony, even if he's already spoken for.
Such as Lalla’s beau, Caleb.
No, what made it the worst party ever was the presence of
the newly-hired pilot, Dewey Treat, and his nice wife, Nancy. Dewey will be out of
a job as soon as the sale goes through.
He's a nice enough fellow, but he ruined the whole party
atmosphere. By falling over dead.
The
police think it might be foul play, although that won’t be confirmed until the
autopsy is completed. But the number one
suspect has already been identified.
His wife, Nancy.
What’s To Like...
A Dead Red Oleander
is the third installment in R.P. Dahlke’s 5-book Dead
Red series. I’m not sure if it is
a completed series or not. The setting
is the Modesto Valley in California, where Lalla juggles being a crop-dusting
pilot, keeping the business afloat, humoring her curmudgeon of a dad, trying
not to get into too many prenuptial squabbles with her soon-to-be husband, and
occasionally solving murder mysteries by not minding her own business. Life’s been busy lately for Lalla.
The story is told from a first-person POV (Lalla’s), with 25 chapters
covering 248 pages. There’s an abundance
of wit, and I enjoyed tagging along with Lalla as she tries to cope with all the
havoc in her life.
I'm pretty sure Aunt Mae and Cousin Pearlie are both new and noteworthy characters. Pearlie in particular plays
a significant role in the investigation of Dewey’s death. My favorite literary car, the Dead Red
Cadillac from Book One is back. And the titular Dead Red Oleander shows up at 27%. It doesn’t impact the storyline much, which
is not a spoiler, and I couldn’t help but think of it as a – (wait for it) – Dead Red
Herring.
R.P.
Dahlke tips her hat to several of her contemporary authors, including two that
have series in this same literary niche genre: amateur
women sleuths. One is well-known: Janet
Evanovich, she of the hugely-popular Stephanie Plum
series. The other is perhaps lesser-known: Jinx
Schwartz who pens a series starring Hetta Coffey,
and I’ve had the pleasure of reading one of her books from this series (reviewed here. R.P. Dahlke mentions a third author, one who I’m
unfamiliar with: Beryl Markham, and her signature book West
With The Night. By coincidence, that
book surfaced as an Amazon daily discount the day after I finished this book;
it now resides on my Kindle.
A Dead Red Oleander is an incredibly
fast and easy read, as are all the books in this series. It is a standalone novel, and you don’t need
to read these books in order, although I am doing so. There’s only a smidgen of cussing, and I don't hesitate to label this a Cozy Mystery. I
enjoyed meeting Pearlie, and here’s hoping that she gets promoted to “recurring
character” status, and becomes – (wait for it again, as I also pay tribute to Janet
Evanovich) – Lalla’s Lula.
Excerpts...
“Will you please
explain to your pig-headed father that goats are farm animals?”
When Spike, my
dad’s arthritic Chihuahua, passed away this last winter, my dad simply wasn’t
ready to get another dog. The goat was a
gift from a neighbor.
My dad held up
his hand to stop the argument. “Bruce is
a pet, Aunt Mae.”
“Bruce!” Aunt Mae threw up her hands. “Your father has Disneyfied a farm animal,
and calling him Bruce isn’t going to change the fact that he’s part of the food
chain and best served with chipotle sauce.” (loc. 400)
Bud’s Bar squatted
on a dusty corner of a nearly abandoned strip mall in Turlock. A neon biplane mounted on top of the building
identified the bar as a place for pilots and wanna-be pilots. I expected to be the only woman in the place
at this time of day, since most women, the ones that loved to hang out with
pilots for fun and profit, were more likely to show up at night. By closing time, anyone still here would have
divided their paychecks between drinks and something that passed for an hour’s
worth of affection. (loc.
1947)
Kindle Details...
A Dead Red Oleander sells for $3.99 at Amazon. The first book in the series, A Dead Red Cadillac, sells for $2.99,
all the others go for $3.99 apiece. The first three books in the series are also
available in a bundle for only $4.99, which is quite a good deal. R.P. Dahlke has two additional books to offer from another trilogy, titled “Pilgrim’s Progress”. Those books go for $2.99 each, or you can
get them bundled with the first three books in the Dead Red series for $7.99.
“Aunt Mae does tend to find
the worm at the bottom of the tequila bottle.” (loc. 1617)
I
had a couple quibbles, mostly with the “mystery” aspect of A Dead Red Oleander. Note:
the following comments are spoiler-free.
First of all, t was never clear to me just how the Ultimate Evil (“UE”) carried out the dastardly deed of
Dewey’s demise. I kept waiting for a
clever twist in this regard, but it never came.
I was also amazed that, however the crime was pulled off, Dewey’s wife
was never aware of it until her hubby collapsed.
Secondly, I’m not sure the local authorities, including
Lalla’s boyfriend, Caleb, who happens to be the local sheriff, would approve of the way
Lalla and Pearlie deal with the bad guys they encounter. Their method of dealing with the UE
particularly strained at my believability threshold, and the fact that the police
were okay with it was even harder to swallow.
Thirdly, the UE several times passes on the opportunity to eliminate pesky little Lalla
from dogging his trail. Yes, an explanation is
given for this, but I didn’t buy it.
Watching the Austin
Powers movies has made me jaded about bad guys delaying in killing heroes due to hubris.
Lastly, I had a problem with how long it took Lalla to figure out who the UE
was. I found the key piece of evidence for solving this to be blatantly obvious.
Yet it takes Lalla the whole second half of the book to catch up to me.
7 Stars.
Don’t let my quibbles discourage you
from reading A Dead Red Oleander. It’s a
fun, fast-paced, and entertaining book, and you’ll enjoy every minute of
it. It’s an ideal beach or airplane
read. Just remember to put your brain to
sleep before opening up the book. Add 1½ stars if you get a thrill solving a book's mystery before the title character does.
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