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By KIKI OLSON
© St. Petersburg Times, published October 1, 2000
FILM STRIP by Nancy Bartholomew (St. Martin's Press, $23.95) -- Sultry Sierra Lavotini is a Panama City stripper/sleuth set on solving what appears to be Mafia-orchestrated murders of sister exotic dancers who'd hoped to make it big in films. Forget the plot (you will five minutes after reading it anyway) and enjoy the zany troupe of co-stars who populate her high trailer- camp lifestyle, including her hairless chihuahua, Fluffy and lover man John Nailor, a local homicide detective. This is a laugh-out-loud look at Florida a go-go, with the added attraction of pole dancers and corpses.
MURDER AT FOGGY BOTTOM by Margaret Truman (Random House, $24.95) -- Daughter of the 33rd president, Margaret Truman is now the author of more than 20 bestsellers based in and around the nation's capital. Her latest is no exception. The new addition is Max Pauling, a CIA counterterrorist appointed to uncover why a New York to D.C. plane crashed at the same time a similar accident occurred in Boise and San Jose. The thread becomes tangled in Russian black markets and State Department secrets but unravels for romance with a pretty researcher who goes for undercover types. The backdrops and cast smack of the "been-there, done-that" school of writing. And the secretary of state who prefers her baseball to summit meetings is a gem of a character.
THE PMS OUTLAWS by Sharyn McCrumb (Ballantine, $24) -- Fans of Sharyn McCrumb's evocative, elegiac Appalachian tales should also enjoy the flip side of her writing coin, which is the fast-paced, clever sleuthing of Elizabeth MacPherson, forensic anthropologist. But even Elizabeth's stories center on social issues -- this time, obsession with conventional standards of beauty. Elizabeth has been hospitalized with depression since her husband's gone missing while her brother/sidekick, Bill, is having tenant problems after buying a mansion he'd planned to convert into law offices. The PMS outlaws of the title are an escaped convict and her fugitive attorney who trawl bars, picking up lusty guys who'd be better off with Thelma and Louise. With signature wit and incisiveness, McCrumb presents another American fable of love and death.
A DANGEROUS ROAD by Kris Nelscott (St. Martin's Minotaur, $24.95) -- It's Memphis 1968, and the city is torn by strikes, riots and winds of change. It's also home to PI Smokey Dalton, whose parents were lynched in Atlanta 30 years before. He was adopted after his parents were mob-executed yet had never been told his -- and their -- history. Enter Laura Hathaway, a rich, white, Chicago socialite wanting to know the reason her mother left Smokey $10,000 in her will. His investigation reveals devastating secrets and lies. Comparison between Nelscott's Smokey Dalton and Walter Moseley's Easy Rawlins are inevitable -- and complimentary.
- Kiki Olson is a writer who lives in London.