Customer Reviews

The Boric Acid Murder: A Gloria Lamerino Mystery

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I was very disappointed with this book, and really had to force myself to finish reading it. The story line is very contrived, motivation is lacking, the characters lack personality, and there is no chemistry between them, not even Gloria and Matt. And someone of her age should have more common sense than to put herself in danger, like the scatter-brained female detectives in today's chic lit, always rationalizing reasons for keeping information to herself and going out alone at night to meet murderers in dark deserted buildings. Her reasoning is a big cliche! I have to agree with the reviewer who said the plot is full of red herrings. In a good mystery all of the pieces should fit neatly together in the end. This one has a few too many irrelevant pieces left over.

Reading this new "elemental" murder mystery by this talented and inventive physicist-author was again a treat. By now, reading how retired scientist Gloria Lamerino is coping with a blooming romance in middle-age, while immersed in crime investigations and targeted by murderous threats is like visiting with old friends. In her fifth mystery the author involved scientists and scientific uses of the title element (Boron) only incidentally, Alas! But she managed to come up with credible lethal mixtures of old history and passions enabled by the new (journalists and librarians searching the internet, nuclear power and nuclear waste, role models for coed highschools). The gentle mixture of the traditional (old friendships, family, love of food) and the novel (female scientist becoming a police technical consultant in her retirement) and the unexpected plot twists make this a wonderful read, with plenty of food for thought, for all ages.

When her fiancée died a few weeks before the wedding Gloria Lamerino packed her bags and moved to California where she taught physics at a major university for thirty years. Upon her retirement, she moved back to her home in Revere, Massachusetts when she meets homicide detective Matt Gennara. For the first time in three decades, she is in a serious relationship while also serving as a special science consultant to the police.

Matt and Gloria are eating dinner at the home of her good friends Frank and Rose Galigani when the police suddenly show up to take the son John of their hosts in for questioning in the death of his ex-girlfriend, Angel Fiore. Even though circumstantial evidence points to John as the murderer, Gloria knows he didn't do it and sets out to prove it with a little help from Matt.

Camille Minchino is a dynamite writer showing readers that life including sex remains strong after fifty. The heroine is gutsy and smart, as she is not afraid to find a killer among a plethora of suspects. The plot is intricately woven with enough red herrings purposely placed into the story line to keep readers from guessing who the real killer is. The BORIC ACID MURDER is a who-done-it that keeps the reader's attention so they won't miss out on the real clues hidden in the overall tale.

Harriet Klausner