Huckleberry Finished

August 24, 2009
Set aboard a Mark Twain–themed cruise on the not-so-peaceful Mississippi, Washburn's snappy second mystery to feature literary travel agent Delilah Dickinson (after 2008's Frankly My Dear, I'm Dead
) shows how much mischief a tour group can get into while confined to a moving paddle wheeler. When one of Delilah's charges, Ben Webster, causes a scene in the casino, the captain calls Delilah on the carpet. Ben later vanishes only to reappear as a corpse. Meanwhile, a charming onboard Mark Twain impersonator, Mark Lansing, takes a shine to Delilah, but turns out to have more than one identity to hide. And Mark isn't alone in harboring secrets, as one teary-eyed tour group member confides that a riverboat employee was murdered precisely one year earlier on the same tract of waterway. Delilah saves more than the day as Washburn smoothly infuses this cozy with hints of romance and humor as well as glimpses of Twain sights in today's Hannibal, Mo.

October 1, 2009
This series, set in the south, has a premise sure to intrigue cozy fans. Atlanta travel agent Delilah Dickinson specializes in literary tours featuring southern authors. Her first adventure centered on locales pertinent to Margaret Mitchells Gone with the Wind (Frankly My Dear, Im Dead, 2008). This time shes leading a tour down the Mississippi River on a steamboat celebrating the life and works of Mark Twain. When one of her tour members ends up dead, Delilah begins her own investigation and soon has her hands full with unexpected adversarial relationships between tour members. Her suspects include a Mark Twain impersonator and even the head of security on the steamboat. Delilah is a likable heroinehonest, a bit self-deprecating, and with a wicked sense of humor. The series has an appealing cast of subsidiary characters, who move in and out of the stories. Fans appetites will be stimulated by Delilahs musing on who her next tour will feature (Harper Lee, Truman Capote, Tennessee Williams or William Faulkner?). The smooth-writing Washburn also includes an afterword with interesting travel tips about the tour destinations.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)