Maddy Hunter, G’Day to Die

G'Day to Die

Maddy Hunter

Pocket, Nov 2006, $6.99, 304 pp.

ISBN 1416523790

Travel escort Emily Andrews is once again on tour, this time in Australia with her Senior center group that she knows from her Iowa hometown. Her grandmother is on the tour as are the two men who want to marry her, Swiss police inspector Etienne Miceli and tour director Duncan Lazarus. They travel together so that Emily can figure out her true feelings about both and decide whom she loves.

Of course a tour with Emily wouldn't be complete without a death. The body of botanist Claire Bellows is found by photographer Guy Madelyn as he and Emily are walking on a trail in Port Campbell National Park. A picture her grandmother took of a native plant thought to be extinct is found near the body. Emily wonders if Claire was looking at the plant and one of the other botanists on the Australian Adventures tour killed her to claim it for their company. She has plenty of suspects and when another tourist is killed by a drug Emily is sure that she was poisoned. Her natural inquisitiveness puts her in danger from a very determined killer who wants certain secrets to stay buried.

In G'day To Die the support cast is eccentric, argumentative, and colorful while adding much humor into a tension filled storyline. There is enough romance to appeal to fans of that genre as well as mystery readers who enjoy a good old fashioned mystery that has plenty of action but no violent scenes. Maddy Hunter provides an amusing yet tense amateur sleuth tale filled with daring exploits.

Harriet Klausner