The Kahuna Killer (Rue Morgue Vintage Mysteries) [Paperback]

Juanita Sheridan (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Janice Cameron's return to Hawaii is "the signal to set off a chain of events which [bring] discord and catastrophe," as well as murder, in Juanita Sheridan's The Kahuna Killer. Originally published five decades ago (though it doesn't feel like it), this detective story featuring charming Chinese sleuth Lily Wu has the friends and foster sisters investigating mysterious events blood on an ancient altar, pagan rights and the appearance of a kahuna (a witch doctor) and the death of a sultry hula girl in 1950s Oahu.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Paperback: 155 pages
• Publisher: Rue Morgue Press (April 24, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 091523047X
• ISBN-13: 978-0915230471
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.2 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,435,160 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Nostalgic Mystery Set in Post-War Hawaii, January 12, 2005

By 

L. Kelly (Lakewood, CO) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Kahuna Killer (Rue Morgue Vintage Mysteries) (Paperback)

Writer Janice Cameron and her foster sister Lily Wu have returned to their home of Honolulu, both with different agendas. Janice has just written a best-selling novel set in Hawaii, and she is working to find a Hawaiian location to film a movie of her novel. Her foster sister Lily is returning to visit her very large extended family, but the reader soon discovers that Lily is also on the trip to keep an eye on her friend Janice.

Janice has been invited to stay in the home of family friends Luther and Maude Avery. The Averys own a large estate near Honolulu, which includes a native Hawaiian village which is the location that Janice would like to use for her movie. Janice must keep her movie-making plans a secret, though, until she gets the Hawaiian villagers to agree. However, immediately upon her arrival in Honolulu, Janice is warned by her native friends that her host's home is a dangerous and unhappy place and she shouldn't stay there. On her second day in Hawaii, Janice discovers the body of a beautiful young hula dancer, apparently a drowning victim in a cove on her host's estate. A series of apparent mishaps gets the attention of amateur detective Lily Wu, who comes to the aid of Janice and identifies who was behind the drowning of the hula dancer.

This was an extremely enjoyable book, and it was hard for me to believe that the book was written more than 50 years ago. I especially enjoyed the descriptions of Lily Wu's Chinese family. "The Kahuna Killer" is the second novel in the "Lily Wu quartet", a group of four novels featuring Janice Cameron and Lily Wu. I am very glad to have discovered the Rue Morgue Press, which is publishing a number of "classic" murder mysteries popular during before 1960. This particular edition was a joy to read and well-edited.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Getting Better, July 22, 2011

By 

Ohioan - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Kahuna Killer (Rue Morgue Vintage Mysteries) (Paperback)

Despite the fact that this book has a hideous cover, I enjoyed the story even more than I enjoyed the first Lily Wu novel, "The Chinese Chop." This is a well-constructed (but fairly easily solvable) mystery in which the motive for murder makes sense. Sheridan is not an experienced mystery writer (this is her second) or possibly even a mystery reader, because she doesn't plant clues. The solution makes sense, though, and that's important.

The story takes a while to get rolling, but I didn't mind because it's set in Hawaii and reading about Hawaii is enjoyable. When Janice Cameron, the series hero and the person from whose point of view the story is told, discovers a dead body, her friend Lily Wu enters the scene. Lily brings a much-needed observing mind to the crime scene. Lily says to Janice: "Twenty-five hundred years of Confucianism have given us [Chinese] an ineradicable sense of reality. We do not accept the inexplicable, which means the supernatural. I believe that everything which is happening here is being made to happen, for a reason. And starting with that premise, I intend to find out why."

Besides the fact that it is set in Hawaii and written by a person who loved the islands, and besides the fact that the heroes are two young women, this book has a powerful appeal because the author is respectful of Hawaii and the culture of its people.

4.0 out of 5 stars This malahini enjoyed it, February 25, 2011

By 

Ron "[e-mail]" (Whidbey Island, WA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Kahuna Killer (Rue Morgue Vintage Mysteries) (Paperback)

I found the second of the "Lily Wu" mysteries more fun than the first, mainly because it takes place in Hawaii and details a lot of information about Hawaiians. It also makes you want to live there. The book is written from the perspective of Janice, who is staying at the home of an old friend of her late father's. Lily is not really the central character, although an important one. The writing is fluid and the mystery is satisfying. Recommended for light mystery lovers.