Murder This Close

In the wealthy Gold Coast enclave of Westport, a feud between

mystery writers turns deadly--and retired spy Dasha Petrov must find

the real killer to clear her name.

Once

one of the most lethal secret agents in the world, Dasha Petrov has

hunted Nazis, Communists, and one common murderer (in The Sea

Glass Murders, the first Dasha

Petrov thriller). But now it's 1991, two years after that

unpleasantness, and Dasha is living a

sedate life appropriate

to an

elderly widow in wealthy Westport, Connecticut, spoiling her

grandchildren and innocently flirting with two of her neighbors, the

rival mystery novelists

Barnaby Jayne and Michael Aubrey.

The

two writers, both wildly successful and many times married, cordially

despise each other. Dasha thinks they're just two silly men with

big egos, but the writers' feud boils over into a bizarre series of

attacks that starts with a blowgun dart and escalates to booby traps

and car bombs. And when Jayne and Aubrey both turn up dead, the

evidence points to one suspect--Dasha herself.

Now

Dasha has to once again call upon her cunning mind and capacity for

extreme violence, honed by her younger years as a Nazi-killing

partisan and a top-rank CIA agent. Teaming up with her old allies,

Westport police chief Tony DeFranco and local TV reporter Tracy

Taggart, Dasha sets out to clear her name, find

the real killer, and figure out why she was targeted--while dodging

jealous wives, a sleazy tabloid reporter, child spies, and a fearsome

Mafia hit man, leading to a tense and dramatic confrontation.

Fast-paced

and filled with intriguing characterization, Murder This Close

is a stunning murder mystery with a twisty cerebral plot and

plenty of hard-hitting action.