Customer Reviews

Dead Air: A Talk Radio Mystery

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Maggie Walsh is a licensed PhD psychologist who gave up her Manhattan practice to become a radio "shrink" in Cypress Grove Florida. She fields call from women who are looking for advice on how to get out of an abusive relationship to an irate man who defends his life as a "furrie" (people who dress up as animals and have sex with each other).

"On the Couch with Maggie Walsh" frequently has special guests sit in for her talk show. Guru Sanjay Gingii is a new age prophet with a huge following. Maggie's roommate Lark is on the Guru bandwagon too. And when she finds out that he's staying at the inn right next door to their condo, well she MUST go over and meet him. Everyone seems to be in love with him. Until that is, he's found dead in his hotel room. Guess he isn't as loved as everyone thought! Unfortunately Lark is the last person seen going into the Guru's room and that makes her the polices prime suspect. Maggie knows that Lark had nothing to do with the Guru's death and will stop at nothing to prove her innocence. She begins to investigate on her own - much to the dislike of the very handsome detective Rafe Martino. Miriam is the Guru's right hand "man" who is about to be replaced by someone younger. Kathryn Sinclair is the mother of a young girl who went to one of the Guru's retreats and has never been the same physically or emotionally since. Lenore Cooper is the Guru's ex-wife, the driving force behind getting him where he is today. Together they wrote numerous bestsellers and had the world in their hands. Now she can barely get anyone to attend her book signings, and blames it all on Sanjay. Travis is one of the Guru's trusted employees who was cheated out of what could be millions. Working for years on his book. he mentions it to the Guru, who ends up turning in it as his own work, robbing Travis of the fame he believes he has earned. Ray Hicks is not in a forgiving mood. He purchased a house from the Guru on the bay, only to have it ripped right out from under him - taken by the City by eminent domain. Causing him to not only lose his new home but his money as well. And he's conviced the Guru knew what was going to happen and the whole thing was a scam. Despite being bashed on the head and receiving threatening phone calls, Maggie is deteremined to find out who the real killer is. But will she be able to figure it out before she becomes the next victim?

Dead Air is filled with a fantastic cast of characters. Maggie is young, smart and refreshing. Vera Mae is Maggie's redneck producer who also has some witty comment and always has Maggie's back. Ted is the love-sick owner of the Inn next door where the Guru is staying. He has it bad for Maggie, but she's just not into him. Lark is Maggie's roommate who is quiet, into all things "new-age", has a shocking secret in her past and is the prime suspect in a murder. Rafe Martino is the hottie detective assigned to the case. He is not happy with Maggie's involvement in the case, but might he want her involved in his life???? And then there is Lola ~ Maggie's mother. What a hoot!! A TV/Movie star who has played in a role for every situation they find them selves in (from a Russian hypnotist to a nurse who has dealt with a patient with a concussion). She will have you in stitches!

Dead Air is the excellent start to the Talk Radio Mystery series. The characters are fresh, fun and exciting. The story moves along quickly and constantly holds your attention. There are plenty of suspects to keep you guessing right up until the very end. And just the perfect hint of sexual tension to keep you turning the pages to find out what, if anything happens. I will definitely be tuning into to the next book in the series, Reel Murder: A Talk Radio Mystery, due out on June 1st.

This is an excellent book. It grabs and holds your attention from the first minute you open it. Being a radio psychologist is a substitute career for our heroine. When she interviews "Sanjay" she immediately sees some definite flaws in his character and her sense of people immediately perks up and tells her that he is NOT what she was lead to believe he was!!

The best character in the book is definitely "Lola", her aging screen actress Mother!! She will lead everyone on a merry chase and helps her psychologist daughter to "sniff" out the murderer!!

You can definitely NOT go wrong purchasing and enjoying this new book....hopefully part of a great new series!!

"Bomb, Bomb! Ohmigod. We'd just gotten a bomb threat. My thoughts scurried through my head like a manic squirrel as I tried to deal with the reality of the threat. Was it a joke? Was it serious? And if there was really a bomb, where was it? Would there be time to evacuate the station? Should I dial 911 or alert the switchboard first? Or the station manager? Was there some procedure I was supposed to follow? I looked over at Vera Mae, and now her eyes were ballooning, her mouth open, frozen in horror like the subject of one of those Edvard Munch paintings. I thought about my mother and my friends and the fact that I was way too young to be blasted to kingdom come. And then an explosion rocked WYME and suddenly I didn't have to think anymore.'

Maggie left her Manhattan practice as a psychologist to take a spot as a radio psychologist in Cypress Grove, Florida. Her show consists mainly of call-ins with an ocassional guest speaker. Maggie's upcoming guest, the famous Guru Sanjay Gingii, has become the talk of the town. Guru Sanjay is highly respected by his followers and the anticipation of Cypress Grove being honored with his presence has starting bring the crazies out of the woodworks. And one of these crazies makes a call to station with a bomb threat.

After the air has been cleared and the station employees are allowed back inside the building, Maggie holds her interview with Sanjay. But later when Sanjay turns up dead, the police go straight to Maggie looking for her roommate Lark. It then becomes Maggie along with the help of her mother Lola to clear Lark and find the real killer, of which there are many suspects to choose from.. ex-wife, ex-girlfriends, ex-partners, ex-friends and on and on.

Mary Kennedy has given her readers humor with a touch of murder in her book Dead Air. As I met each character/suspect I assured myself that I had this story "figured out." I knew who murdered Sanjay. Then the next character came into play and proved me wrong making me believe that this character must be the murderer. This went on throughout the book. Dead Air is a book that will truly hold you in suspense until the end.

This was a surprisingly good cozy mystery, and the author is an authority on her subject, psychology. The main character, Maggie Walsh, is a clinical psychologist in Florida and is also the host of a radio talk show. When a guest on her talk show is found murdered, Maggie finds herself involved in solving the case. The main suspect is her roommate, so Maggie has a vested interest in finding out the real killer. Along the way she has help from her mother (a washed-up starlet with great people skills), and her roommate (Lark). She also butts heads quite a bit with the lead detective, Rafe Martino, a by-the-book cop who warns Maggie off the case. There are a lot of minor characters throughout the story and the mystery is actually a good one. It isn't easy to determine whodunit and that was good. It's definitely a good read, and a smart one, and I'll check out the next installment when it's published.

This is the beginning of a great new series. When Maggie's roommate become a person of interest, Maggie with the assistance of her boss and her mother, Lola, this case takes on a whole new meaning, especially with the acting abilities of Lola.

I enjoyed this first in a new series. Maggie was a likable character and the storyline kept you guessing until the end.

Two things though. First, wannabe-actress mother sidekicks are starting to get old. The new yoga series features the same concept. Second, if the author is going to set her series in a fictional town "north of Boca, not far from Palm Beach," she should get a better handle on local geography. First off, Briny Breezes is north of Ft. Lauderdale, not south. Second, people in this area go up to Orlando, not down to Orlando.

Looking forward to the next installment.

My wife could not believe that super manly me (how funny) was reading a pink book! I took it to restaurants and the Jury Room without the need for a cover (like Perl Programming Made Easy). Hey...I'm secure. ;-)

Well.....I read "Dead Air" and it was great! Every now and then a good lighthearted mystery lifts your spirits (as much as murder and mayhem can), "Dead Air" did just that.

Sidestory: In an email conversation with Mary Kennedy she told me that her agent sold the book in 24 hours with five words: "Frasier Meets Murder She Wrote". Since I liked both shows, it was a no brainer for me to read "Dead Air". And, how cool is this, a "Lilith" even shows up...

Maggie Walsh, a beautiful, 32 year old psychologist, left New York City for sunny Florida (Cypress Grove) seeking a fresh start with cool job as a radio show host. WYME's "On the Couch with Maggie Walsh" is less than a stellar performer (tied for last with "Bob Figgs and the Swine Report") in a small market. But Maggie gets her fair share of interesting guests and, one in particular, promises to boost her ratings.

Guru Sanjay Gingi is a well known "New Age prophet" from Miami. He has written several best selling books and has hoards of loyal followers. The instant he enters Maggie's radio world, she feels she is in the presence of a charismatic con man, not a prophet.

During the show, Guru Sanjay helped sooth the psyches of a number of callers and the show was a rousing success. Guru Sanjay invited Maggie to his conference the next day at the Seabreeze Inn (which happens to be next door to Maggie's house).

At home that night, Maggie describes her meeting with Guru Sanjay with roommate Lark Merriweather. Lark, as it turns out, loves Guru Sanjay and would give anything to meet him. After dinner, Lark excuses herself and leaves the house for the drugstore. Or so she said.

The next morning Maggie gets a call from the station asking if she can cover the early news. They are short handed because of the big news: Guru Sanjay was dead. And it looks like murder. Yikes!!!

At that moment, handsome Detective Rafe Martino was knocking on Maggie's door. It turns out that Lark is a suspect in the murder and there appear to be no other suspects the police are pursuing. Double Yikes!

Time for Maggie to jump into action and find the killer.

"Dead Air" moves at an even brisker pace from here as Maggie and, later, her mother, Lola an aging (ha...she is MY age!) actress, find several people with motive to kill Guru Sanjay (who we find out is not the nicest guy in the world).

Does Maggie find the killer? Is it Lark? Do Rafe and Maggie hook up? Hmmm, you will have to read "Dead Air" to find out. :-)

I really enjoyed this first book in the "A Talk Radio Mystery" series. Mary Kennedy tells me that all three books have been turned in, so I suspect the wait for the next one will be, thankfully, short.

If you want a quick, fun, lighthearted mystery to read, you will definitely enjoy "Dead Air". Frasier meets Murder She Wrote indeed.

By [...]

If you want proof that 'youth is wasted on the young' -- read this book. You'll quickly see what I mean, after about page 113, and the very next page is Chapter Thirteen -- is that an omen or what? -- when the heroine's wannabe actress Mom makes her appearance. Thank you Lola! You absolutely resurrected this book from a case of terminal stupidity!

For the first 100 pages, I kept thinking 'why do we need yet another 300-page, wrong-headed female amateur sleuth cozy mystery, anyway?' You'd think a 'licensed PhD psychologist' would have acquired some smarts by the age of 32, wouldn't you? Especially one licensed to practice in New York City? There's extensive grad school (3-4 years), a stiff licensing test and many hours of clinical supervision to get to the point of being able to establish a practice.) Well, this one acts as though she'd been hatched yesterday, full-grown, as is. (Almost TSTL.)

Maggie Walsh had no back history to speak of -- no former boyfriend, husband, or even a father mentioned anywhere in the book! But who cares? Once Mom (the perfectly-named Lola) is on the scene, one needs little else. Mom has had seemingly a zillion bit parts in movies and TV shows, from each one of which she has learned some little tid-bit that makes enormous sense and sends the two of them off in another direction in an attempt to solve the mystery.

The mystery? Oh, right. Well, the geographically-challenged Maggie has moved to Florida to take a job as a radio talk-show host. (Right.) One of her guests is the ruling feel-good New Ager, Guru Sanjay Singii, who, after a rather lack-luster program (in conjuction with a conference at the next door b&b) ends up transitioned. Who did him in? And why?

Maggie and Mom find half-a-dozen suspects, including Maggie's room-mate, Lark. Handsome policeman Rafe Martino keeps warning her to stay out of it, but Maggie cannot leave it alone. It's no fault of hers that she doesn't end up in the same condition as the Guru. Thanks to the combined efforts of Mom and Maggie's dog Pugsley, the killer is apprehended and all's well that ends well.

Apparently Mom will be in book two, so I'll give it a try. I can only hope book two has a better proof-reader, also.

I loved the WYME radio crowd. As a NY transplant, Maggie Walsh needs a psychologist of her own to fit into small town life in Florida.
Her mother, Lola, has immense charm and their adventures reminded me of Lucy and Ethel and their madcap plots. This is an entertaining
fast-paced read with likable characters, who do manage to solve a mystery, but it's the fun along the way that will keep me going back for
more of the Talk Radio Mysteries.

I just got done reading the first book in this series. It was not too bad just slow along the way for me. I will try the next book in this series though as the author does a good job at keeping us guessing almost till the end of who really killed the Guru. Maggie does seem to be lucky to be in the right place at the right time.