Candy, Corpses, and Classified Ads Review

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(More customer reviews)This intriguing romantic suspense novel involves a potbellied pig, Melvin, a septic tank, a pitchfork, and Molly Lawson's dead (murdered!) ex-husband. Could things get worse for Margaret Olivia Lawson, since the police officer investigating the case is none other than the deliciously still attractive JT McCord, who jilted her eighteen years ago? JT McCord has returned to Tangle Butte as Chief of Police. Candy-loving Molly, now the News Editor of the Tangle Butte Daily Tribune, finds herself in an odd position.
After JT ditched her for someone else, Molly moved on to marry twice... except that her first husband, Delbert, died and her second husband, Sam, ran off with a hairdresser, or so everyone thought. Molly has given up on romance but finds that her resolve is somewhat shaken by JT's reappearance in Tangle Butte.
By helping JT with the case, and trying to prove she is not the Number One suspect in her ex-husband's murder, she finds that old attractions die hard and her original feelings for JT soon resurface ... just like her ex-husband Sam Ferris' body! Our feisty heroine finds murder on her doorstep, under the living room window, to be exact, and when Molly's life is threatened several times, things turn downright dangerous.
The problem is that when Sam's body resurfaced, with a little help from Melvin, the pot-bellied pig with a penchant for digging up flowerbeds, so did some past dirty financial deeds committed by the less-than-honest inhabitants of the town. Tangle Butte, population 4,145, isn't a hotbed of passion, or greed, or power... or is it?
The author accurately paints an often hilarious picture of small-town life interspersed with sex, murder, gossip, copious amounts of M&Ms, alarmingly accurate Tarot card readings, cryptic romantic classified ads and, it seems, quite a lot of adultery. As the investigation progresses, old hurts, memories, and grudges are exposed. Lost loves, affairs, financial shenanigans, and possible motives for murder, abound.
Molly, a budding crime novelist with three murder mysteries under her belt and a fourth in the making, finds that she is in more danger than she suspected. Sam wasn't quite the louse everyone thought he was, and when it's discovered that poison, and not a pitchfork, was the weapon of choice, the net starts to tighten on a guilty member of the Tangle Butte community. Will JT make the arrest before Molly meets an unfortunate end?
J. L. Wilson has created appealing, believable characters in Molly and JT. They are a tad older than in a usual romantic suspense novel, but still desirous of love and passion. The quirky secondary characters, especially Molly's mother, Yolanda, are well fleshed-out and add piquancy to this exciting murder mystery.
A well-paced plot and realistic dialogue show that the author has an excellent grip on what makes a small town tick. A particularly amusing note is the local book club, Monday Readers Social Exchange, (known to its members as `Mr. Sex'), whose members eschew literary masterpieces and have banned Oprah's Book Club selections as being too `uplifting.' They prefer romance novels, murder mysteries, and sci-fi. Such delightful incidents and more abound in this enjoyable novel, giving a touch of wonderful realism and charm to the tangled exploits taking place in Tangle Butte.

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Twenty years ago, JT McCord jilted Molly Lawford. She survived and moved on to marry twice, but her first husband died and her second husband ran off with a hairdresser. Molly gave up on romance and settled down in Tangle Butte, Minnesota, as a small town reporter. Now JT McCord is back in town as the Chief of Police. His first official act is to investigate how Molly's thought-to-be-vanished husband turned up buried next to the septic tank in Molly's back yard, dug up by a neighbor's marauding pig. While helping JT unravel the facts, Molly's resolve about keeping him at bay unravels, too. If she can survive a couple of attempts on her life (and maybe arm wrestle a couple of town hussies for JT's affection) she might find the love of her life-all because of a pig and some plumbing.

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