Pennies on a Dead Woman's Eyes - Hardcover

Muller, Marcia

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0892964545 ISBN 13: 9780892964543

Publisher: Mysterious Pr, 1992

Synopsis

Feeling guilty for testifying against her mother more than thirty years ago in a trial for the murder of a wild San Francisco debutante, a young woman asks Sharon McCone to help reopen the case. 25,000 first printing.

About this title

Reviews

The 13th Sharon McCone mystery brings good luck to readers as Muller's veteran San Francisco PI explores crimes of passion and politics as they were played out in the Bay Area during the pre-Beat 1950s. In an intricate plot, McCone agrees to help lawyer Jack Stuart, her colleague at All Souls Legal Cooperative, build a case he will retry in the legal profession's Historical Tribunal. Stuart will defend Lisstet Benedict, who was recently released from prison after doing time for killing and mutilating her husband's young lover in 1956. Benedict was convicted on the testimony of her then-10-year-old daughter, now Stuart's lover, who hopes a new trial will turn up evidence, clearing her mother and exonerating herself. McCone finds herself emotionally drawn into the decades-old crime, especially to the murder scene--a now-uninhabited Seacliff mansion that then housed the Institute of North American Studies, a conservative think tank where Benedict's husband worked. Anti-Communist sentiment and personal betrayal figure large in the resolution of the 36-year-old crime and contemporary deaths that its revisiting inspire. Vintage Muller. Mystery Guild dual main selection; Reader's Digest Condensed Book selection.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Another convoluted puzzle for San Francisco's Sharon McCone, investigator for All-Souls Legal Cooperative (Where Echoes Live, 1991, etc.). This one goes back to 1956, when Lis Benedict, wife of biochemist Vincent, was convicted of the grisly murder of her husband's young mistress, society playgirl Cordy McKittridge. Now released from jail, Lis is living with daughter Judy, who was a ten-year-old witness at her trial and soon after was adopted by prosecuting D.A. Joseph Stameroff, now an influential judge. Judy has persuaded All-Souls lawyer Jack Stuart to undertake a reinvestigation of the case, in the guise of a mock trial before a San Francisco institution called the Historical Tribunal. As Sharon explores the background and relationships of those long-ago years, ominous things start to happen in the here and now--nasty graffiti, threatening phone calls, and two deaths (at least one of them murder). It all ends in florid melodrama as the trial draws to a close. A heavily overembroidered plot; murky motives; too many characters with unconvincing total recall; glimmers of mysticism and lots of psychobabble--all add up to a dull, disjointed outing for an often engrossing author. -- Copyright ©1992, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

In another lawyer-oriented mystery, established series investigator Sharon McCone uses her wiles to solve a 36-year-old slaying. The recently released woman convicted of killing a beautiful San Francisco socialite asks McCone to prepare her defense for a mock trial at the Historical Tribunal--a task that McCone approaches with some misgivings until phone threats, confrontations, and another murder prove that someone doesn't want the case reopened. Steadily mounting tension climaxes in the re-created trial. Sure to interest series regulars and even draw a few new fans. Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 3/1/92.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Mysterious Pr
• Publication date: 1992
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0892964545
• ISBN 13: 9780892964543
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 297