S
et in New York City, Haines’s assured debut brings the WWII era to vivid life, from a topical jump-rope song (“Whistle while you work. Hitler is a jerk...”) to Automats and jive joints. On New Year’s Eve 1942, actress Rosie Winter, whose day job is with a Manhattan detective agency, finds the body of her boss, Sam McCain, hanging in his office closet, his hands and neck tied with phone cord. The investigating cop calls Sam’s death a well-deserved suicide, but there’s a missing play that a reclusive playwright and a rich widow want found. Rosie, a fast-thinking Hepburn type, takes on the case, aided by her best pal, Jayne (“a petite blonde with... the voice of a two-year-old” dubbed “America’s squeakheart”). This is a fun romp, though the author, herself a playwright and actor, provides some dark commentary on avant-garde theater and war as well as an unexpected and wicked twist in the novel’s final act. (June)
