From Publishers Weekly
If you took a Ross Macdonald plot, injected a silly love triangle replete with soap opera-ish misunderstandings, moved the action to San Francisco and made the private eye a woman who engages in lame tough-girl dialogue, you'd have a mystery similar to this one. PI Odyssey Gallagher is hired by Aletha Holmcroft to find her very rich husband's latest bimbo who, she says, left a dead cat on the doorstep as a threat. Odyssey soon locates Rachel, who denies anything about a cat and is frantically trying to get out of town because she has narrowly escaped a killer's bullets. Od also discovers that her own ex-boyfriend Charlie Gore has been hired by Mr. Holmcroft to find Rachel. After Mr. Holmcroft, who's involved in some shady deals, is gunned down in front of his ritzy club, Rachel disappears. There are more murders, adultery, blackmail, suicide and an unlikely ending. Also a very large red herring, though readers will probably spot the killer one-third of the way through. Less explicable is Odyssey's interest in loutish Charlie. Edgar-nominated Frey ( A Long Way to Die ) has done better.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Kirkus Reviews
Semi-tough California (yes, another one) p.i. Odyssey Gallagher listens to the rich Mrs. Holmcroft's sad tale--her hubby's mistress, Rachel Collins, an employee of the Lemming Cocktail Lounge, has been harassing her with calls and a parcel containing a dead cat--and agrees to track down Rachel and ask her to desist. Rachel, however, is missing; Mr. Holmcroft has his own p.i. on the case; and the bodies, including Mr. Holmcroft's, soon start piling up. Meanwhile, Holmcroft's real love, his mousy secretary, is distraught; Odyssey's stodgy boyfriend Martin moves out when her old lover, opportunist Charlie Gore, makes new moves on her; and Odyssey's boss, Mr. Frampton, wants her to drop the case. Furthermore, Mrs. Holmcroft and her overcoddled, sadistic son are alternately alibiing and then incriminating each other. Tailed, shot at, and lied to, the indomitable Odyssey perseveres and, finally, untangles the business shenanigans from the romantic and homicidal ones, and, with an assist from Charlie, saves the state the cost of a trial. Edgar-nominee Frey (A Long Way To Die) has the p.i. conventions down cold: cynical imagery, personal code of justice, soured love-life. With fewer cute encumbrances (martial-arts sessions, for instance), Odyssey could develop into someone worth knowing. -- Copyright ©1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
