As a follow up to Skinny-Dipping, author Claire Matturo delivers her second mystery featuring the striking obsessive-compulsive attorney Lillian Belle Rosemary Cleary. “Lily” is single and a junior partner at a reputable firm in Sarasota, Florida, happily practicing law with the help of her friend and legal secretary, Bonita.
Lily is in the process of preparing an oral argument for the appeal of a wacky client who claims to be a psychic. Up to her ears in work, she hardly welcomes interruptions at this point in her life, much less being stuck in the middle of unsolved murders. Of course, that is exactly where Lily lands – smack dab in the middle of a murder investigation involving the owner of a local vineyard, a law partner at her firm, and a third victim of the backwoods variety.
As Lily investigates the murders, it appears that even she and Bonita are suspects. Lily has a potential romantic interest in Phillip, the criminal attorney who is representing her as well as Bonita. However, Phillip cannot fully protect Lily’s interest due to her constant snooping in the murder investigation, since Lily has a change of heart and decides to investigate the murders after all. Clearly someone is not happy with Lily’s informal investigation when she starts finding things like live rattlesnakes in her car.
As the cast of potential suspects increases, Lily practically gives up billing at work and spends most of her waking hours sleuthing. The cast of colorful characters are funny without being too over the top. Matturro does a good job of creating an intricate mystery with a clever twist at the end; while the mystery is clever, the reader is unlikely to get “lost” along the way. I recommend this book to fans of light mysteries.