The Sound of Murder by Cindy Brown, a Mysterious Review.

Review: Ivy Meadows — that's the stage name for theater actress Olive Zweigwart — just wants to live someone else's life, if only for a little while. And she has that opportunity, having been cast in a musical, a combination of The Sound of Music and Cabaret, to be held at the Dessert Magic Dinner Theater. This musical features postulant Mary being sent to the sleazy Vaughn Katt Club to teach singing to the immoral dancers. But Olive also wants to be a private investigator and she works for her Uncle Bob at his Duda Detective Agency as a PI in training. After a fire in her apartment she moved into a senior citizen's community near the theater to care for a home while the owner was away, and finds herself on a case, in The Sound of Murder, the second mystery in this series by Cindy Brown.

Ivy drives into the wrong driveway one night and when she starts into the house, she hears a noise in the garage. A car's motor is running. She calls the police, who find a man dead behind the steering wheel of a new car. The police think that the man, still grieving over the death of his wife, had committed suicide. But, why would a man buy a new car if he was planning suicide? It wasn't long before Ivy finds out that the community has been experiencing an unusual number of suicides, each done in a different manner. The daughter of the suicide victim comes to her to ask her to please check into her father's death, as she is sure he would not have killed himself. Soon Ivy begins to suspect that possibly none of the deaths were suicides. But who would murder the elderly persons, both men and women, and why?

Ivy, in her mid-twenties, realizes she has a lot to learn as a private investigator, and, to be sure, as an actress in a musical (she has trouble singing on key if there are more than four or five people in the audience), too. But she realizes she can practice as both if she gets into the shoes of a real-life character. The case is like a musical mystery: there are quite a few eccentric characters and the back stage is filled with trivial jealousies, petty egos and insecure anxieties. It also presents a list of names, one or more of which could just be a murderer.

The Sound of Murder is a very enjoyable mystery in what is quickly turning out to be a very enjoyable series. Ivy's investigation is well-structured, and leaves the reader guessing until the very end. Separately, the musical is hilarious in concept and even more so in execution, with the lyrics of the familiar songs being changed to fit the unusual circumstance of a nun in a risqué club. One can sing right along while reading and laughing at the same time. Overall, a charming and thoroughly entertaining mystery.

Special thanks to guest reviewer Betty of The Betz Review for contributing her review of The Sound of Murder.

Acknowledgment: Henery Press provided an ARC of The Sound of Murder for this review.

Macdeath
Henery Press (Trade Paperback), January 2015
ISBN-13: 9781940976693; ISBN-10: 1940976693

The Sound of Murder

An Ivy Meadows Mystery by Cindy Brown