Death Penalties: a Luke Abbott Mystery - Softcover

Gosling, Paula

3.26

88 ratings by Goodreads

9780330320252: Death Penalties: a Luke Abbott Mystery

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0330320254 ISBN 13: 9780330320252

Publisher: Thorndike Press, 1992

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A widow must investigate her husband's fatal accident in order to determine which one of her acquaintances is secretly harassing her

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From Kirkus Reviews:

More sluggish than most Gosling outings, this venture begins with the hit-and-run death of Roger Leland, which still causes his son Max nightmares. Was it a mere accident--or more? When retired cop and sole witness Ivor Parks dies mysteriously, Sergeant Tim Nightingale, on his own time, begins niggling away--and discovers that: Mrs. Leland has been receiving a series of threatening calls asking her to return ``it''; an intruder's been by; and her redecorating of Dolly McMurdo's mansion has been stymied by the counter-orders issued by Dolly's nephew, Archie (whom, it later turns out, Dolly has never heard of). Chief Inspector Luke Abbott, now on full alert, joins forces with Nightingale and, with keen interrogation techniques, uncovers the dead man's problem--he was an unwilling drug courier who ultimately absconded with the profits. But the real baddies aren't brought to justice until Nightingale's ribs take a pummeling, Max is kidnapped, and the McMurdo mansion is turned topsy-turvy. Earnest, with a serviceable plot, but the Abbott/Nightingale detecting team is so low-key as to be tedious, and Gosling's fervid imagination seems to be napping this time out. -- Copyright �1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

From Publishers Weekly:

British award-winner Gosling adds another taut tale to her series featuring Detective Chief Inspector Luke Abbott, now in London. After Roger Leland, dies in a car crash, his American interior-designer wife, Tess, is beset by further troubles. Her home is burglarized; she receives unnerving silent phone calls. When her son Max comes down with rheumatic fever, she hires a widowed Cambridge scholar to tutor the boy in exchange for housing. Max's co-guardian opposes the plan even though Tess, whose phone caller has begun to demand money, expects to feel safer with a man in the house. Concurrently Detective Sergeant Tim Nightingale learns from the diary of a recently deceased retired politician that Roger's car was run off the road by a man who after the crash tried to pry open the trunk. Tim must convince Luke that the string of events are not merely coincidences. With stylish turns of phrase and special insights, Gosling tells an exciting tale that builds to a breathtaking finale in the London tube. Mystery Guild alternate.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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