Sylvia Kurtz Detour

Detour

Sylvia Kurtz

Silhouette Bombshell, Aug 2006, $4.99

ISBN: 0373514182

In Nashua, New Hampshire private investigator Sierra Martindale is a workaholic handling dangerous cases. Her current one involves a 285 pound muscleman Finn Murdock who teaches professional wrestling and whose shoulder injury should prevent him from lifting. Her case is to prove he is a fraud. However he and his goons chase her up the Merrimack to make sure she has no evidence that would affirm he has no injury until she suddenly collapses. A heart transplant saves her life.

However, she gets more than just a dead woman's ticker, Sierra finds herself communicating with the ghost of the donor. The deceased woman Sofia James claims she was murdered and her killer got away with the crime by making it look like an accident. Feeling she owes this woman her life, Sierra investigates starting with the widower, Wyatt, who may just be the killer or her soulmate.

This paranormal private investigative romantic suspense is a fascinating thriller in which the late Sofia provides clues (at too many opportune moments) to help spur the no longer risk taking sleuth to investigate her death. Gender bending the Hoskins-Washington movie Heart Condition, DETOUR is a strong fun tale though the dribbling of information from beyond leaves a shaky premise as readers will wonder why Sofia just didn't confide right away all she knows. Still this is a fine thriller as the heroine wonders just who she is.

Harriet Klausner