Distractions Can Be Murder

After thirteen years, Julia Mallory is a little bored with her job as a commercial lender in a large bank. Cranky customers, tedious staff meetings, and a secretary who thinks she's in charge of the department strain her good nature. Add in a copy machine that won't stay fixed and innumerable staff wedding, baby or birthday showers, and Julia is in sore need of a diversion. When she investigates what seems to be a simple accounting error, she thinks maybe she's found something to break the routine. Her curiosity leads her into some interesting places - city government offices; snarled accounting records; meetings that, for a change, don't bore her; neighborhoods with buildings that aren't all they're supposed to be. Her circle of acquaintances also increases. She adds a pompous city official and a suave do-gooder to the list. All in all, things seem to have brightened up. As she follows the clues she digs up, she learns that maybe the dull office routine had its compensations. Still, Julia sees an interesting side to every situation she finds herself in, and the thought of letting sleeping dogs lie goes against her nature. When she finally straightens out the tangle, the results surprise her, in more ways than one. This is a reissuance of this book, originally written in 2000.