Nursing Homes Are Murder

March 3, 2014
In Befeler’s disappointing sixth Geezer-Lit mystery (after 2013’s Care Homes Are Murder), the local cops ask octogenarian Paul Jacobson to go undercover at the Pacific Vista Nursing Home in Honolulu, Hawaii, where female residents are being sexually assaulted late at night. They are also being robbed—and one woman winds up dead. The cops have several suspects in mind, including Hugh Talbert, the evening cleaning crew’s supervisor. Before the crime can be solved, however, the culprit goes after Paul’s wife, Marion. The supporting cast—Paul’s fetching wife; his granddaughter, Jennifer, ever eager to assist him in his sleuthing; and his blind roommate at Pacific Vista—are companionable, and Befeler’s frankness about Paul and Marion’s sex life is refreshing. But Paul’s corny jokes grow old, and the repeated discussion of his short-term memory loss (and the diary he uses to outwit it) becomes tiresome. Suspense proves lacking, and the mystery’s solution seems to come out of nowhere.