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Title: Murder Me Now
ISBN: 0446678910
Author:
Annette Meyers
Publicate Date: 2002-02
Publish: 2002-02
List Price: $21.99
Average Customer Rating: 4.0
Format: Paperback
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Amazon Lowest New Price: $10.40
Amazon Lowest Used Price: $0.08
Amazon Merchant Price: $21.99
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| Customer Review: |
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1: Disappointing sequel...
I was hoping for some improvement in the characterization in this second Olivia Brown novel, but it didn't happen. It's disappointing, because there is so much potential here.This time, a nanny working for one of Olivia's friends is found hanging in a tree in the backyard of her employer's house. Harry, Olivia's P.I. tenant, is asked to investigate, and they find some secrets while uncoverig the nanny's past. As in the last book, the Greenwich Village/flapper/Prohibition historical setting is well done, but it's as if the characters are just passing through, and we don't get to know them. It's a shame--a novel of lost poetntial. I doubt I'll look for another one in this series.
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2: O.K.
The protagonists have no soul, they seem caricatures - not people you would care about. So many coincidences also lead to plot being less than believable. Nice enough try, but I will wait for the library copy of the next one
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3: Oliver! Oliver!
She's back, Olivia/Oliver Brown, poet/sleuth, that is.This time she joins her bohemian friends at a rustic farmhouse for a weekend of gin, games, gossip, and sex for sex's sake. And the intrigue begins when tempers flare and the host and hostess seem to part ways. Then Olivia and current squeeze, Paulo, discover an icy apparition hanging from a tree. The frozen female is none other than the nanny of the host and hostess, Fordy and Kate Vaude. The investigation of the suicide turned murder moves to Greenwich Village as the weekend guests return there for their "normal" lives. Thus, Olivia, Harry, Mattie, Gerry, and the Hudson Dusters once again join ranks to solve things first. (They all came together in Meyers' first Olivia Brown mystery, Free Love.) Olivia waxes poetic and enthralls every male with whom she comes into contact, including the underworld character Monk Eastman who showers her with booze by the crate and roses by the dozen. Meyers' delivers this easy read and keeps the solution a secret until the end. This Oliver adventure involves characters in the Secret Service, the Pinkertons, the Black Hand, and the Ivy League poetry effete. Olivia is still not my favoriate protagonist, by any means, but Meyers' certainly sets a scene of the decadence that followed the Great War in 1920's New York.
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4: Great Character - Great Fun
Olivia Brown, 1920s Bohemian poet and part-time detective, is a most fascinating character, sophisticated and intelligent, but tending to be rather theatrical and headstrong. Obviously based upon Edna St. Vincent Millay (she is even called "Oliver" by her friends, as Millay was called "Vincent"), she and her milieu are quite convincing. The Greenwich Village that she resides in seems completely authentic, along with the real-life characters with whom she associates, such as Edmund "Bunny" Wilson and Susan Glaspell, and the atmosphere of prohibition, with its speakeasies and bootleggers.The investigation of the murder of a maid (who turns out to be an undercover agent) is intriguing. And the diversions of the Black Hand gang, trying to discourage Olivia's prying, and rival mobster Monk Eastman, who displays a romantic interest in our heroine, add to the suspense. The ending, when we finally discover "whodunit," really doesn't depend to any great degree on the whole progress of the investigation, and the novel comes to a rather disconcertingly abrupt close. But who cares? It has been a great ride, and I'll be first in line for Olivia's next adventure.
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5: Excellent Series - Strong Woman, Interesting Plot
This is the second entry in the Olivia Brown series set in 1920 Greenwich Village. In this outing, a nanny has been murdered at the home of Olivia's friends. Her tenant Harry Melville has been hired to investigate the murder and Olivia volunteers to assist. As they begin asking questions, the responses raise more questions than they answer. This is an excellent series. The characters are well-drawn and interesting, the reader genuinely cares about Olivia and Harry as well as the minor characters. Meyers makes you feel the angst of the young men who survived WWI and Greenwich Village comes alive beneath her talented pen. The plot in this outing was more strongly drawn than in the previous entry in the series. The only problem I have with the series is that I have to wait a year for the next entry.
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