Love for Sale (Grace & Favor Mysteries, No. 4) - Softcover

Churchill, Jill

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0061031224 ISBN 13: 9780061031229

Publisher: Avon Books, 2004

Synopsis

If Lily and Robert Brewster no longer have a penny to their names, at least they have a roof over their heads in this bleak Depression November of 1932 -- the sprawling estate of their late great-uncle in Voorburg-on-Hudson. But then a badly disguised stranger offers to pay generously to hold a very secret meeting there shortly before the national election. And soon one of the mystery guests is murdered in his bath, a local grade school teacher goes missing, and a little boy is kidnapped. With Pretty Boy Floyd rumored to be somewhere near, the nasty business smacks of underworld activity -- or possible political conspiracy aimed at sabotaging Roosevelt's election. Either way, Chief Howard Walker has nowhere to house all the suspects except at the local Hospital for the Criminally Insane. And the Brewster siblings are going to have their hands full tying the various ends together . . . and ferreting out the killer who abused their hospitality.

About this title

About the Author:

Jill Churchill has won the Agatha and Macavity Mystery Readers awards and was nominated for an Anthony Award for her bestselling Jane Jeffry series. She is also the author of the highly acclaimed Grace and Favor mysteries and lives in the Midwest.

From Publishers Weekly:

Agatha and Macavity winner Churchill once again brings the Depression era to appealing life in her latest well-plotted cozy (after 2001's Someone to Watch Over Me), set in Voorburg, N.Y. Siblings Robert and Lily Brewster, genteel victims of the '29 crash, run a guesthouse at Grace and Favor Cottage. On the eve of the 1932 presidential election, a "Mr. Smith" offers Robert and Lily $500 as a down payment on rooms for himself and three of his "business associates," who wish to hold a private meeting over several days. Can these men be gangsters, desperate Hoover supporters plotting to stop FDR at the last minute, or even Reds out to disrupt the election? Badly in need of cash, brother and sister reluctantly agree to the arrangement. When one of their mysterious guests gets murdered in his bath, Robert and Lily have even more cause to regret their decision. The victim turns out to be Brother Mark Luke Goodheart, a scoundrel who preached love and goodwill on the radio while fleecing the poor, the indigent and orphans. Lending some mild suspense are the disappearance of a local school teacher, the brief kidnapping of the boy Joey Towerton and Joey's mother's wait to learn whether her husband has been killed while working on Hoover Dam. Older readers will especially enjoy this look at dire times now safely past.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Avon Books
• Publication date: 2004
• ISBN 10: 0061031224
• ISBN 13: 9780061031229
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• Number of pages: 272