Book Review: Body Wave

Reviewed By: Harriet Klausner

Body Wave     Amazon US PB Amazon US HC Amazon Canada PB Amazon Canada HC
Nancy J. Cohen
Class/Genre:   Mystery   Amateur Sleuth   Woman Main Character
Series: Bad Hair Day # 4
Kensington, Dec 2002, $22.00, 240 pp.

Stanley Kauffman comes down to breakfast only to see his trophy wife lying on the floor, bleeding from a wound to her chest. When the police arrive, they declare her dead and arrest him. He calls his ex-wife, hairdresser Marla Shore, to meet him at the jail and asks her help in clearing him of the charges. He promises her that if she will, he will sell his share of the property they jointly own at a decent price.

Marla agrees because she wants the property and because she believes Stanley would never physically harm a woman. Marla goes undercover at the compound of Stanley’s in-laws by becoming a nurse’s aid to the matriarch of the family. She discovers that almost everyone in the household had a motive to murder Stanley’s wife and further investigation with her boyfriend Detective Dalton Vail turns up even -more suspects. If Marla isn’t careful, the perpetrator will try to kill her to stop her from revealing what she figured out about her ex-husband’s wife’s death.

Anyone who reads BODY WAVE will come away thinking it is an upbeat amateur sleuth mystery populated by a host of eccentric characters. The heroine is a bold strong woman who is not afraid to get in a person’s face when she thinks she is right. Nancy J. Cohen is a talented writer who is famous for her complex plots and characterizations as this tale substantiates.

Harriet Klausner

Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Harriet Klausner