Without a Clue
Trish Jensen
Harlequin Flipside, Feb 2005, $4.50, 218 pp.
ISBN: 0373442084

In Charleston, events planner Meg Renshaw hosts a weekend murder mystery gala. However, the festival goes poorly even before it begins as her assistant Tina Brown tells her the "corpse," Shakespearean actor Terence Brogan, is so high probably to hide from how low he has fallen he would not feel a cement truck land on his head. Terence explains that he is a professional regardless of the gig, but he had emergency root canal surgery and is not inebriated; instead he is filled with pain pills slurring his words. That is the positive highlight as Meg concludes that Murphy was an optimist as everything seems to be going wrong and the weekend is just starting.

Developer Matt Rossi comes to the estate he owns and rented to Meg. She and Tina persuade him to act the lord of the manor as her corpse. Out of character for the staid Matt, he agrees because he is very attracted to the creative Meg. She reciprocates though she feels somewhat like a necromantic sex fiend except this corpse stays warm and alive as he tries to lure her into his coffin, make that his bed.

Though the theme of a prim and proper male meeting a loose, extroverted female (think Sabrina) has been done plenty of times, Trish Jensen refreshes her tale with two wonderful opposites struggling with a wacky weekend made wackier by love. The lead duet is a likable pair and the support cast augments the plot by bringing to life the fun and pitfalls of the mystery weekend. The clues are obvious that this is an amusing romance in which the heroine gets the live corpse.

Harriet Klausner