Beach Money

An easygoing style laced with humor makes for an entertaining and suspenseful series debut. When one of his business cards is found among Judson Fitch's effects, Ocean City, Md., motel owner and part-time attorney Dallas Henry is hired by New York stock analyst Teresa Jane Fitch to find out why her brother jumped from a condo balcony. Having given up the law for the lure of the surf, Dallas isn't excited about accepting actual work, but agrees to look into the young man's death. In pursuit of information--and not immune to having fun at the same time--Dallas goes to Ocean City's notorious collegiate party house and talks to students about Jud, who had been arrested for drug possession. When he finds a dead man in the spare bedroom of Jud's condo and the trail of clues leads to yet another fatality linked to Jud, Dallas finally puts it all together. With occasional lapses in the moonlit surf with Teresa Jane, Dallas strolls the fine line between reluctant amateur detective and devoted beach idler, animating this appealing mystery by the pseudonymous Mack (Maryland attorney Preston Pairo III). (May)