Murder, She Wrote: Three Strikes and You're Dead

Fans of the TV series Murder She Wrote are probably well aware that there are a series of bestselling books too. This reviewer is a big fan of the series and an equally big fan of the books too.

In THREE STRIKES AND YOU’RE DEAD, Jessica is visiting her friends, Judge Jack and Meg Duffy in Arizona. Their foster son Ty plays baseball for the Mesa Rattlers. When Ty scores the winning run, the owner, Harrison Bennett is not so thrilled. His son Junior and Ty are bitter rivals and everyone feels the tension between them. When Junior Bennett is found dead, killed with a baseball bat, Ty is immediately a suspect as he was seen fighting with Junior outside a bar. Jessica can’t believe that Ty could do something like that, he is a fine young man who although has had a troubled past, has shown more than his worth. She soon finds out for some people, baseball is more than just a game.

This is a mystery/crime story in the true tradition of Agatha Christie with Jessica Fletcher as a modern day Miss Marple. The plot is exciting with lots of red herrings thrown about so that the reader is really racking her brain trying to find out who dunnit!! There is a lot of ambience in this story, with sights, food and sounds described that draw the reader into the milieu. The reader is taken behind the scenes of the baseball world including the intrigue, jealousies and business of the big game. This reviewer had a lot of fun reading this story and is already a big fan of the books with quite a few of them on her keeper shelf.

November 2006