Irish Eyes: A Callahan Garrity Mystery (Callahan Garrity Mysteries) - Hardcover

Andrews, Mary Kay

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0060194219 ISBN 13: 9780060194215

Publisher: Harper, 2000

Synopsis

“Entertaining. . . . If you are up for a big helping of humor and heartbreak, insanity and intrigue, read Irish Eyes.” —Orange Country Register

Callahan Garrity is the owner of House Mouse, a cleaning service that tidies up after Atlanta's elite. She's also a former cop and a part-time sleuth. She and her coterie of devoted helpers can ransack a house for clues faster than it takes a fingerprint to set.

When Callahan Garrity gets caught in a liquor store holdup on the way home from a St. Paddy's Day party, one of her best friends is shot. Callahan and her House Mouse cleaning crew dive into the investigation—only to discover that her old friend might have been working both sides of the law as an accomplice in a string of robberies. It will take every trick they've got to pierce the veil of secrecy surrounding an Irish police organization and prove that the case is more than it seems.

About this title

About the Author

Mary Kay Andrews is the New York Times bestselling author of 24 novels, most recently The Weekenders, as well as 10 critically acclaimed mysteries. A former reporter for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, she lives in Atlanta, Georgia.

From the Back Cover

Irish Eyes is the latest entry in Kathy Hogan Trocheck's delightfully engaging and suspenseful mystery series featuring the remarkable Callahan Garrity and the outrageous band of "girls" in her Atlanta cleaning crew. Callahan has her hands full for St. Patrick's Day with a crime spree that hit., close to home--and close to her heart.

When Callahan was an Atlanta cop, her partner, Bucky, was a stand-up guy, and he and Callahan have remained the best of pals. Now Bucky needs a date for the annual St. Paddy's Day bash, and Callahan grudgingly goes along. With Mac, her longtime beau, talking about a possible move to Nashville, she's in need of a fun night out. What she gets instead is the shock of her life.

On the way home, Bucky is shot in what looks like a liquor-store holdup while Callahan waits in the car. She's stunned when accusations fly that Bucky is a cop on the take and that he's actually been an accomplice in a string of robberies.

With Bucky in critical condition, his life and reputation hanging in the balance, Callahan and her crew set out to find the truth. As feisty and relentless as ever, Callahan, her lovable mom, Edna, and her ragtag band of House Mouse employees rely on their usual plucky determination and unorthodox sleuthing skills to get answers. This time, it will take every skill they've got to pierce the veil of secrecy surrounding an Irish police fraternal organization and prove that the case is more than it seems.

In true Trocheck fashion, Irish Eyes is an exciting, heartwarming story filled with lively, unforgettable characters. Witty and entertaining, it is also the biggest, best Callahan Garrity outing yet, tension-riddled mystery that probes the depths of corruption, friendship, and betrayal.

Reviews

Atlanta PI and former police officer Callahan Garrity displays her usual pluck in the eighth outing of this warm-hearted series. On the way home from a St. Patrick's Day party, Garrity and Bucky Deavers, her partner on the robbery squad from her days on the force, stumble on a liquor store holdup. Bucky is shot in the head while a key witness, the liquor store cashier, flees the scene with her screaming baby. Garrity has her work cut out for her. Bucky, like many underpaid cops, has been moonlightingAas a security guard for the owner of the store where the robbery took placeAand the police suspect him of having been involved in the crime. To clear her former partner, who lies close to death in the hospital, and to locate the missing witness, Garrity enlists the aid of the Shamrock Society, whose members include ex-cops from the Atlanta neighborhood where she grew up; she also calls upon two elderly sisters who work for House Mouse, the cleaning business Garrity runs to pay the rent. After another cop is shot, Garrity begins to suspect that something is rotten at the Atlanta P.D. Meanwhile, her current love, Mac MacAuliffe, is contemplating a job offer in Nashville. Trocheck skillfully blends family, generational, ethnic, racial, medical and criminal conflicts into her Irish stew. Her Garrity is an appealing heroine, hard-working and principled, while Bucky is just one of many well-drawn members of the community of family and friends for whom she gives her all in this satisfying tale. (Mar.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

A story called Irish Eyes that begins on St. Patrick's Day and features a protagonist named Callahan Garrity would seem to be aimed at a very targeted audience. In fact, this eighth installment in Trocheck's series will appeal to Irish and non-Irish alike. Former Atlanta cop Garrity returns to crime solving when her ex-partner, Bucky Deavers, is shot on the way home from a party he finagled her into attending at the Shamrock Society. With the help of the eccentric staff of her housecleaning business, Garrity vows to get to the bottom of the shooting. This is an entertaining, suspenseful romp. The plot zips along but not too fast to blur the exceptional characters. Trocheck's obvious firsthand knowledge of Atlanta makes her descriptions of the city shine with realism. Evanovich fans will appreciate some similarities, but Trocheck's humor is drier. Irish eyes won't be the only ones smiling while reading this first-rate thriller. Jenny McLarin

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Chapter One

One of my clients, who has superb taste in these things (he's gay), gives me a bottle of Bushmills for Christmas every year, and every year I hoard it until the afternoon of St. Patrick's Day.

At six o'clock on the afternoon of the appointed day, I took the bottle down from its hiding place in the cupboard over the refrigerator. I set two Waterford tumblers square in the middle of the scarred oak kitchen table. I poured a fingerful of whiskey for Edna, my mother, who drinks hers neat, and one for myself, on the rocks with a little water. Solemnly, we clinked glasses.

Selah! said Edna.

Back at ya, I said.

She dealt herself a hand of solitaire. I went to the kitchen counter and fiddled with the radio until I found WABE, the local National Public Radio affiliate. Usually, we listen to the news this time of day, but today I was hunting for the station's annual all-Irish program.

As soon as I sat down I had to jump back up and turn off the radio. They were playing Danny Boy.

Edna gave me a quizzical look.

Not that one, I said. It's too early in the day. It always makes you cry.

She nodded thoughtfully. You could be right. It's better to work up to all these things. She slapped a row of cards facedown on the table. Although, she added, all those lousy songs get to me.

They remind you of Daddy?

She sighed. He sure loved St. Patrick's Day. Remember?

How could I forget? He used to make us dress all in green, head to toe. Then drag us over to Christ the King for Mass with the archbishop.

You kids marched in that parade every year from the time you were babies, Edna said. One year one of the Meehans brought a goat cart into town. You remember that? We piled all you kids in a damn goat cart and your daddy walked on one side of you and Billy Meehan walked on the other side, both of them grinning like idiots, and that goat prancing down Pharr Road like some kind of fine Arabian stallion.

I remember being in a cart, I said. The goat had a little straw hat with an Irish flag sticking out of the top. And Daddy bought us hot chocolate because it was so cold that day. And Maureen threw up all over my green plaid skirt, the little snot.

She always did have a weak stomach, Edna said, smiling. Go ahead and turn the radio back on. Maybe they'll play McNamara's Band.'

But they were playing Rose of Tralee, and Edna's eyes got suspiciously moist, so that she had to duck into the bathroom because, she claimed, she'd dribbled something down the front of her blouse. But she didn't come back for another five minutes, and when she did, she hadn't bothered to change her blouse, so I knew it was a ruse.

It started raining around six-thirty, softly at first. But soon rain started coming down in slashing gusts. I was standing at the back door, looking out at the lightning flashing and dancing on the horizon, when somebody banged at the front door.

Edna looked up from her cards. Get that, would you?

I almost didn't recognize our visitor, he was so changed from the last time I'd seen him.

Six-four, with dark hair slicked back from his forehead and a pair of stylish horned-rim glasses, he looked like a mutual-fund banker, not the slapdash cop I'd known for fifteen years or more.

Bucky?

Bucky Deavers pushed past me into the hallway. Christ! It's coming down in buckets out there.

He stood there, dripping rain onto the floor, until I came to my senses and took his coat. Under the raincoat he wore a forest green blazer, pleated khaki slacks, a crisp white shirt, and a shamrock-print necktie. He had a sprig of heather pinned to his jacket lapel.

Very nice, I said, motioning for him to turn around, which he did, ending with a little mock curtsy. Is this another of your phases?

We're going to a party, he said, grinning.

We? Who we?

We, as in you and me, he said.

The last party we'd been to together was a Halloween frolic at the Euclid Avenue Yacht Club, where he'd gone as Jackie Kennedy in drag.

Where's your pink pillbox hat? I asked.

At the dry cleaner's, he said. Blood spatters are hell to get out of pink. Come on, Garrity. Get going. We're late already.

What kind of party? I wanted to know.

Whaddya mean, what kind of party? Did you just resign from the Irish race, Garrity? It's St. Patrick's Day.

I know what day it is, I said. And that's why I'm staying home, where it's safe. You know my policy about this, Bucky.

Yeah, yeah, he said, waving his hand dismissively. St. Patrick's Day is amateur night. You wouldn't be caught dead in Buckhead, yada, yada, yada. But that's okay. We're not going anywhere near Buckhead. So get dressed, would you?

I looked down at my blue jeans and my blue work shirt. Supposing I were to go to this party with you. What's wrong with what I've got on?

He shook his head sadly. It's a party, for Christ's sake. You look like a refugee from a hippie commune. Come on, Garrity. You've got a pair of world-class gams under those jeans. Throw on a dress or skirt or something, would you? Something green, preferably.

I narrowed my eyes. What's the deal here, Bucky? Since when do you care how I dress?

He pushed me down the hall toward the kitchen. . .

Edition details

• Publisher: Harper
• Publication date: 2000
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0060194219
• ISBN 13: 9780060194215
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 304