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The Maltese Manuscript
A Karen Pelletier Mystery
Joanne Dobson
Poisoned Pen Press (Hardcover)
ISBN: 1-59058-039-7
Publication Date: February, 2003
List Price: $24.95
Synopsis (from the publisher):In classic noir tradition, English Professor Karen Pelletier gains a client when her office door opens and a famous Private Eye novelist enters. The author is dogged by Trouble (a Rottweiler) and by a problem. And since Sunnye Hardcastle (a Patricia Cornwell lookalike) will be a featured speaker in the English Department's upcoming conference on the murder mystery (from a Feminist Perspective), Karen is intrigued.
The next thing you know, one midnight someone rushes out of the Enfield library with an armload of rare books. In fact, the library is missing a truckload of its treasures. Then a suspect is found dead in the stacks, his neck broken. With a real private eye on the case, the hunt is on -- for the manuscript of Hammett's famous novel, The Maltese Falcon, for the missing books, and for potential murder suspects.
A sparkling fifth entry in an award-nominated series by Fordham University professor Joanne Dobson riffs the hardboiled genre and several sacred icons. What is truth? What is fiction? No one seems certain. Perhaps most frustrated is Karen's boyfriend, Massachusetts police lieutenant Charlie Piotrowski, a man having trouble dividing his personal and professional life, let alone translating modern academic-speak. But then, don't we all?
Review: English Professor Karen Pelletier returns after an absence of several years in The Maltese Manuscript, the fifth mystery in this academic series.
There is much for mystery readers to enjoy in this book. Using a classic mystery novel (The Maltese Falcon) as a component to the plot which takes place during a mystery writers conference is clever and Dobson clearly makes the most of it. Academic environments always lend a interesting atmosphere to mystery books, and the setting here works well for the story. A feminist mystery author, rare first editions gone missing, and the inevitable murder victim are more elements in this enjoyable book.
Academic mysteries take many forms, from highly literate to exceptionally soporific, but The Maltese Manuscript tends to be casual and light. Maybe not the best of this series, but certainly one of the most entertaining to read.
Special thanks to Poisoned Pen Press for providing the ARC of The Maltese Manuscript for this review.
Review Copyright © 2003 Hidden Staircase Mystery Books
Other mysteries in this series by Joanne Dobson:
Quieter
Than Sleep
A
Karen
Pelletier Mystery
Doubleday
(1997)
ISBN:
0-385-48692-8
The
Northbury Papers
A
Karen
Pelletier Mystery
Doubleday
(1998)
ISBN:
0-385-48693-6
The
Raven and the Nightingale
A
Karen
Pelletier Mystery
Doubleday
(1999)
ISBN:
0-385-49339-8
Cold
and Pure and Very Dead
A
Karen
Pelletier Mystery
Doubleday
(2000)
ISBN:
0-385-49340-1
