Getting Lucky

Surprisingly intense characterization propels Brod’s likable sequel to Getting Sassy. After a hit-and-run driver kills Claire Powell, a reporter working for a weekly newspaper outside Chicago, freelance journalist Robyn Guthrie takes over Claire’s story about a struggling local housing development. The assignment leads to discoveries about toxic dumping and mob financing. Though the basic plot may sound predictable and the characters look like jaunty stereotypes, Robyn uses her sharp intelligence and wry sense of humor not just to investigate crimes but also to cope with personal relationships. Robyn’s wonderful boyfriend may want to have children; the housing developer’s ostentatiously perfect wife was Robyn’s chief tormentor in high school; and her elderly mother nags at her to buy a house so they can move in together. Any of these situations could have lapsed into cliché, but Brod keeps them convincing and even moving as Robyn appreciates the complexity of the individuals around her. (Dec.)