The Dead Cat Bounce

With the advent of amateur sleuth Jacobia Tiptree, Eastport, Maine, could become as deadly as Cabot Cove. Having left the daily grind of her job as a financial adviser in New York, Jake, as she is known to her friends, has settled in an old house in Eastport with her teenage son, Sam, away from her annoying ex-husband, the brain surgeon. When Jake discovers a dead man in her storeroom, an ice pick stuck in his head, her tranquillity is up-ended. Her friend and neighbor, Ellie White, starts acting strangely and then confesses to murdering the man, one Threnody McIlwaine, an old friend of Ellie's father and a ruthless corporate raider. Jake is quickly convinced that Ellie is protecting someone--perhaps her vicious mother or her father, who was ruined by McIlwaine--and despite threats to her own well-being continues nosing into the dead man's past. In her polished debut, Graves blends charming, evocative digressions about life in Eastport with an intricate plot, well-drawn characters and a wry sense of humor. (Sept.)