The Murders of Mrs. Austin and Mrs. Beale - Softcover

McGown, Jill

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0449221628 ISBN 13: 9780449221624

Publisher: Fawcett, 1993

Synopsis

"Clever and surprising."
THE KIRKUS REVIEWS
Both victims were dishy, but that's all murder victims Leonora Austin, struggling artist, and Rosemary Beale, ex-call girl had in common. It's a disturbing case for newly promoted Detective Inspector Judy Hill, who knew Leonora, but also for her boyfriend, Detective Chief Inspector Lloyd. But when investigating the complicated romantic lives of Mrs. Austin and Mrs. Beale, including their husbands' past and present lovers, Hill and Lloyd uncover cold-hearted greed and calculated ambition--and a killer (or killers?) wanting to finish the job....

About this title

About the Author:

Jill McGown, who died in 2007, lived in Northamptonshire and was best known for her mystery series featuring Chief Inspector Lloyd and Sergeant Judy Hill. The first novel, A Perfect Match, was published in 1983 and A Shred of Evidence was made into a television drama starring Philip Glenister and Michelle Collins.

From Kirkus Reviews:

Dual murders for Detective Chief Inspector Lloyd of the Stansfield CID and girlfriend Judy Hill (Murder at the Old Vicarage, etc.) in the nearby Malworth district. Lennie Austin, a friend of Judy's who's married to politically ambitious Jonathan, is found bludgeoned to death in their apartment. Hours later, a few miles away, Rosemary Beale, wife of rich, in-the-rackets Frank Beale, is found strangled in their plush, security-tight apartment. The Beales' neighbors are Gordon Pearce and his pregnant wife Pauline. Pearce's failing engineering firm had been rescued by Austin's business acumen, but Rosemary, a new member of the board of Austin-Pearce, was pushing to get Pearce out. Rosemary's chauffeur Steve Tasker, hired by her husband, was a past lover of Lennie Austin's and was trying to relight those old fires on the night she died. Wheels within wheels as Lloyd, his overanxious new Sergeant Mickey Drake, and Judy try to make sense of it, talking ceaselessly like everyone else (plus inner voices) in this overstuffed, overwritten story. The solution, when it finally arrives, is clever and surprising; getting there is verbose, confusing, and a touch pretentious. -- Copyright ©1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

About this edition

• Publisher: Fawcett
• Publication date: 1993
• ISBN 10: 0449221628
• ISBN 13: 9780449221624
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• Number of pages: 256