Susan McBride, Night of the Living Deb

Night of the Living Deb

Susan McBride

Avon, February 2007, $6.99

ISBN: 0060845554

In Dallas, defense attorney Brian Malone accompanies his friend Matty Karas, a groom, to "The Men's Club" bordello, as his engaged buddy wants a lap dance before he says I do. Bored with the "Stepford Strippers", Brian cannot wait to leave so he can sit on the lap of his girlfriend Debutante Dropout Andrea "Andy" Kendricks, Brian is stunned to recognize one of the dancers. He goes over to see her, but suddenly goes down the proverbial "rabbit hole". No one has seen him since.

While Brian vanishes, his former girlfriend and legal partner Allie Price takes a reluctant Andy to see the Chippendales perform. As she watches the hunks show off their wares while performing, Andy pictures her socially correct upper class mother, Cissy having cardiac arrest for her daughter breaking the upper crust rules again by attending this show. Not long afterward Matty tells Andy that Brian dumped him at The Men's Club to leave with one of strippers; Andy knows her Brian too well to believe that, though Allie insists otherwise. However, Allie "the Blond Menace" and the Debutant Dropout investigate, with both knowing that she will be the one to boast I told you so.

The fourth debutant dropout mystery (see THE LONE STAR LONELY HEARTS CLUB) is a delightful humoresque amateur sleuth tale, starring enemy combatants teaming up to learn what happened and why to the missing Brian. Readers will enjoy the Blond Menace's assessment that Brian ran off with a hooker vs. the loyal Andy insisting he must have been abducted. Fans of the series will enjoy this lively entry that starts with the club celebration, and never slows down until the end when the heroine kicks herself with her pinching Manolo's.