Murdering Americans (Robert Amiss/BaronessJack Troutbeck Mysteries) - Hardcover

Edwards, Ruth Dudley

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1590584139 ISBN 13: 9781590584132

Publisher: Poisoned Pen Press, 2007

Synopsis

""Academia (n.): a profession filled with bad food,
knee-jerk liberalism, and murder...

Being a member of the House of Lords and Mistress of St Marthas College in Cambridge might seem enough to keep anyone busy, but Baroness (Jack) Troutbeck likes new challenges. When a combination of weddings, work, and spookery deprives her of five of her closest allies, she leaps at an invitation to become a Distinguished Visiting Professor on an American campus.
With her head full of romantic fantasies inspired by 1950s Hollywood, and accompanied by Horace, her loquacious and disconcerting parrot, this intellectually-rigorous right-winger sets off from England blissfully unaware that academia in the United States is dominated by knee-jerk liberalism, contempt for Western civilization, and the institutionalisation of a form of insane political-correctness.
Will the bonne viveuse Baroness Troutbeck be able to cope with the culinary and vinous desert that is New Paddington, Indiana? Can this insensitive and tactless human battering-ram defeat the thought-police who run Freeman State University like a gulag? Does she believe the late Provost was murdered? If so, what should she do about it? And will she manage to persuade Robert Amisswho describes himself bitterly as Watson to her Holmes and Goodwin to her Nero Wolfeto abandon his honeymoon and fly to her side?

About this title

About the Author:

Since 1993 Ruth has written seriously and/or frivolously for almost every national newspaper in the Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom and appears frequently on radio and television in Ireland, the UK and on the BBC World Service. Ruth feels both Irish and English and greatly enjoys being part of both cultures. The Anglo-Irish Murders, her ninth crime novel, is a satire on the peace process. Three times a bridesmaid, she has been shortlisted by the Crime Writers Association for the John Creasey Award for the best first novel and twice for the Last Laugh award for the funniest crime novel of the year.

Review:

""Political correctness run amok provides the motive for murder at a Midwestern university.

Accepting a lucrative offer to become a Distinguished Visiting Professor at Freeman State University, Baroness ""Jack"" Troutbeck arrives in New Paddington, Ind., with her vocal parrot. An intellectually honest conservative, Jack is appalled to find that the school is run with an iron fist by the crooked, mean-spirited triumvirate of President Dickinson, Provost Helen Fortier-Prichardson, and her vicious assistant, Dr. Ethan Gonzales. Jack's driver Betsy, an earnest, barely literate student, gives her a primer on the trio's tactics, which range from intimidation to grade inflation to enforced enrollment in ridiculous classes. After hiring a Mike Hammer wannabe to look into the state of affairs, Jack is enraged when the investigator and his partner are killed in a bogus accident, and her outspoken comments start a riot. Luckily, she has a gun, provided by the delightful southerner she met on the plane from London, a traveling companion whose lawyer son is soon defending her from every effort to force her out. Refusing to give up on Freeman, Jack persuades Robert Amiss, her Watson, to abandon his bride during their honeymoon and fly to her aid, and finally mobilizes the students to turn things around and help catch a killer.

Edwards (Murder in a Cathedral, 1997, etc.) pens a scathing, often amusing attack on over-the-top PC."" --Kirkus Reviews

About this edition

• Publisher: Poisoned Pen Press
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 1590584139
• ISBN 13: 9781590584132
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 236