My Very Own Murder [Paperback]

Josephine Carr (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 6, 2005

Free-spirited and freshly divorced, fifty-year-old Anne Johnson is living the good life. She spends her days in her luxurious, elegant apartment in Washington, D.C., cuddled up with a book in one hand and a martini in the other. Then, she hears a voice in her head, warning that there'll be a murder in her building in thirty days-and she must prevent it. Anne confides in Mary, the building's large-and-in-charge cleaning woman, and together, they plan a party to ferret out the would-be killer. But if they don't act quickly, the swanky soiree might end up being a goodbye party for both of them.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Sweet, witty, and unexpected."
- Nancy Martin --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

About the Author

Josephine Carr, author of The Dewey Decimal System of Love, lives in Washington, D.C., where her college-age son and daughter frequently visit her. She attended school in Kenya and Switzerland, and has degrees in English Literature from Mt. Holyoke College and Bryn Mawr College.

Product Details

• Paperback: 258 pages
• Publisher: NAL Trade (September 6, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0451216466
• ISBN-13: 978-0451216465
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.3 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,772,475 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars As crisp as a well-chilled martini, October 10, 2005

By 

Gale Zasada "www.brownbookloft.com" (Maryland, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: My Very Own Murder (Paperback)

Anne Johnson, a mid-century thoroughly modern divorcee, lives a life to which many women secretly aspire. She is independently wealthy, has two well-adjusted adult children and lives in a ritzy high-rise downtown Washington D.C. apartment worthy of Architectural Digest. Although she spends her days experimenting with new recipes, napping, sipping martinis, cleaning her extremely tidy apartment and wafting about in her favorite white gown while thinking about sex, she tells herself and her family that she's not bored, that her life is absolutely perfect, just as it is.

Then one day she hears a voice in her head, a voice that tells her that a murder will be committed in her apartment building within 30 days. The voice also says that she has the power to prevent this murder.

Anne confesses this unusual event to Mary, a stout, ebullient African-American woman who works in the building as a cleaning woman. She doesn't clean Anne's apartment since Anne loves to clean, (a passion that I cannot begin to understand) but her position does give her access to and knowledge of many of the residents. Anne and Mary each decide that one of the top candidates for murderer of the month is a suave, handsome thirty-ish Russian gentleman. Mary's investigative techniques involve eavesdropping and observation; Anne follows her overactive libido and decides to sleep with him.

I vicariously enjoyed the many martinis imbibed throughout the novel, as this is my Friday end-of-workweek drink of choice. But my absolute favorite part was the secret passage, a device rarely used in an adult book. It took me back to my pre-teen years when I passionately read dozens of "girl running away from castle" books.

If you are looking for light entertainment and you aren't wedded to a particular genre preference (I couldn't quite figure out whether this book was a romance with a dash of mystery or a mystery with frivolous flings), pick up a copy of My Very Own Murder. To enrich your overall experience, I suggest you dress in your most comfy "I feel good about me" outfit and apply a chilled martini on your lips.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars delightful spicy mystery, well written...., September 30, 2005

By 

Laurel Johnson (Kansas USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: My Very Own Murder (Paperback)

Anne Johnson is fifty years old, recently divorced from a faithless husband, and not suffering in the slightest from that loss. At age fifty, Carr's heroine is still feisty and fit. She lives in a spacious luxury apartment in Washington D.C. and enjoys her quiet time curled up reading by the fireplace. Life is fine just the way it is. She's quite comfortable with her current situation except for missing sex and hopes her hunky neighbor, Ivan Chernislava, might rectify that shortfall.

One night while sipping a martini, a voice comes to Anne out of nowhere. "A murder will occur in sixty days. Prevent it." Anne wonders if that disembodied voice is due to one too many martinis, or if she's finally fallen into schizophrenia but decides preventing a murder might be entertaining for awhile at least. She enlists the help of Mary, a savvy Rubenesque cleaning lady, to help find the potential murderer. Their list of suspects includes the sexually robust Ivan, whom Anne lustily "investigates" as often as her strength allows. She and Mary plan a cocktail party for residents of her apartment complex, in hopes of uncovering the murderer, dragging Anne's ex-husband, children, and Mary's husband into their scheme. The results are often hilarious but just as frequently hair raising as these two friends track down a killer.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars lighthearted serio-comic amateur sleuth, September 7, 2005

By 

Harriet Klausner - See all my reviews
(#1 Hall OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: My Very Own Murder (Paperback)

When Anne Johnson discovered her husband was cheating, she divorced him but unlike most women who catch their spouse cheating, she is content because she was never happy in her marriage. She moves into the prestigious Kennedy apartment building and she misses neither her husband nor her children as she revels in being alone and being able to decide what she wants to do.

The fifty year old divorcee is shaken to hear a voice in her head saying that a murder will occur in the Kennedy in thirty days and she must prevent it from happening. Not knowing what to think, she goes to the laundry room where she meets Mary, a cleaning woman for many of the apartments in the building. She confides about what the voice says to Mary who doesn't believe Anne is crazy. Together they cook up a scheme where Anne has a housewarming party so that they can look for potential murder suspects and victims. What follows is a friendship that involves a whacky investigation that leads to the criminals who want to silence Anne before she finds out their secret.

This is a lighthearted serio-comic amateur sleuth mystery based on a voice in the protagonist's head. The heroine is a delightfully quirky individual who marches to her own drummer and her friendship with the cleaning lady is instant. The mystery of who is behind the suspected crime comes very late in the book but readers won't feel any disappointment because the author is, without being obvious, sprinkling clues that leads to the killer throughout the tale. This is a very special, unique and exciting mystery featuring characters that are razor sharp and diabolically clever.

Harriet Klausner