JOAN HESS – Strangled Prose. Claire Malloy #1 (of 20). St. Martin’s, hardcover, 1986; Ballantine, paperback, February 1987; St. Martin’s, paperback, 1998.
A reception for an author of romantic novels at Claire Malloy’s bookstore is disrupted when it is discovered that several characters in the lady’s latest epic have very close counterparts in real life. When she’s later found murdered, Lt. Rosen helps investigate.
The book is a lot of fun, perhaps too much so. The witty repartee is all but but endless.Everyone is a master of it, and it (eventually) is too much. In spite of the barbs, Claire and Rose are attracted to each other. (No surprise.)
— Reprinted from Mystery.File.4, March 1988.
