Cady Kalian, As Dead As It Gets

As Dead As It Gets

Cady Kalian

Forge, Aug 2006, $14.95

ISBN: 0765313642

Former New York investigative journalist Maggie Mars got her big break with an article that brought her to Hollywood as a screenwriter. In Los Angeles she is working on a script involving what else but an investigative reporter. Maggie also belongs to the Creative Artists Union affectionately called COW by the CAU members.

However, when CAU executive director Roger Urban is found dead in a bathtub garbed only in a garter belt and bra, Maggie's previous "life" kicks in as she needs to investigate. Her former lover back in New York, but now part of LAPD, Joe Camanetti warns her to stay out of his official investigation as he knows Maggie will snoop. Unable not to sleuth, Maggie begins making inquiries finding Urban was a sleaze and being warned to back out of the case by an unknown adversary. When an apparent related suicide occurs, LAPD claims the case solved, but Maggie says no way and soon the killer targets the nosy Maggie.

As Dead As It Gets is a fun Hollywood investigative tale that follows the adventures of a heroine whose former lover and her father plead with her to stop her sleuthing. Maggie makes the tale as a courageous individual obsessed with solving the homicide. Having a roommate who is the queen of Hollywood gossip is in some ways too convenient, but readers will not care as Lionel's light gossipy banter adds to the locale and the feel of a delightful lighthearted Hollywood (and Manhattan) murder mystery.

Harriet Klausner