I have seldom had so much fun with a book, especially a first book! I found Charlie's Bones an absolute treat!
Lizbet Lange is 23, the daughter of two hippies (now deceased), a former truck stop waitress, and an absolute doll. A few years ago she married Tom Lange, who was 62 at the time and married her on a dare. They divorced a year later and Tom went on to strike it rich. Being a 'mean old bastard,' he cut his previous wives and children out of his will and left it all, including the manse, to Lizbet.
Not long after she moves in to all this splendor, Lizbet decides to put in a pool … and that's when the trouble starts. Splash and Shine Pools promptly digs up Charlie. Charlie has been good and dead for some time which wouldn't be too much of a problem except that Lizbet can see him and hear him! Charlie was murdered and his ghost is on a mission. And guess who gets to help.
When Charlie's son shows up - nearly as handsome as Charlie - things start to get very interesting indeed.
I told him. And then I rattled on and on while the eggs cooked and all the time we were eating. I told him about Duke and Lady and how they died and Tom and Tom's fortune and how I'd ended up with it and pretty soon I was telling him all this really personal stuff about how I don't have any friends now that I'm rich because my old friends are uncomfortable around me or else they want me to give them money to set them up in business and how I don't feel comfortable with rich people and how it was really lonely living here by myself and on and on and on and on. It was pathetic, but I couldn't seem to stop talking. Partly I think I kept going on and on because it was so weird to be sitting here with Charlie's son while Charlie himself was sitting next to me, eating my eggs and watching us.
This book is lots of fun. Lizbet is a terrific protagonist, sassy and funny, with lots of future potential.
This is another terrific book from Write Way Publishing. I don't know anything about this small publisher except that they've got a good eye for a mystery series!
Write Way Publishing hc April 1998
Charlie's Bones, ISBN 1-885173-47-4
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