Peri Minneopa has heard her name mangled a thousand ways to Sunday and hates them all. What she does like are clean houses, and dirty martinis. She recently traded in her housecleaning business for a P.I. license. Her timing seems perfect, when she cleans a former client's freezer and finds a severed hand inside, wearing an expensive ring. The client, Benny Needles, is a Dean Martin fanatic who swears he's innocent. But where there's a hand, there's a body, waiting to be found. It's a brand new world for Peri, and she has a lot to learn. Her boyfriend, Skip, a detective in the Placentia Police Department warns Peri that this case could be dangerous, but she can't stop sticking her nose into the middle of things. Her first lesson is that investigating murder can have bad consequences. In the middle of trying to solve the case, Peri takes on a surveillance job. The philandering husband is unhappy with her, and she discovers that even surveillance isn't always low risk. As the two cases collide, will Peri learn the truth behind both of them? And more important, will she ever get that dirty martini?
Gayle Carline is a typical Californian, meaning that she was born somewhere else. She moved to Orange County from Illinois in 1978, and landed in Placentia a few years later.
Her husband, Dale, bought her a laptop for Christmas in 1999 because she wanted to write. A year after that, he gave her horseback riding lessons. When she bought her first horse, she finally started writing.
Gayle soon became a regular contributor to California Riding Magazine, and in March, 2005, she began writing a humor column for her local newspaper, the Placentia News-Times. Every week, she entertains readers with stories of her life with Dale and their son, Marcus.
Believing that she should experience reincarnation while she is still alive, Gayle has been a software engineer, a dancer, and even a flying angel for the Crystal Cathedral's Glory of Christmas.
In her spare time, Gayle likes to sit down with friends and laugh over a glass of wine. And maybe plan a little murder and mayhem for the next novel.
