Poppy Harmon Investigates is great fun for fans of madcap stories like those featuring Stephanie Plum and Serge Storms!
Poppy discovers soon after her husband’s death that he has gambled away their life saving and over-mortgaged the house. Poppy, a 62-year-old former C-level actress, must find some way to support herself. Her most famous television role as a private detective’s ditzy secretary makes her decide to open her own detective agency in her hometown of Palm Springs. Poppy’s daughter Heather feels her mother is wasting her time pursuing detective work. However, Poppy hires her daughter’s actor boyfriend Matt as the young and handsome face of the agency along with her two retired friends, blunt Iris and shy Violet, and Violet’s techie 12-year-old grandson Wyatt. Poppy soon gets her first case—a burglary of an elderly, still somewhat famous singer (think Doris Day) Shirley Fox. Shirley’s gated retirement community has been victim to a rash of these crimes. When a body is found by Poppy, the game suddenly gets real.
Poppy Harmon Investigates is a hilarious look at how aging is viewed in our society. I absolutely loved the characters in this book! It is hard not to see myself in Poppy’s desire to be a private eye and solve mysteries like the ones in the books she has been solving all her life. You have to admire her chutzpah in getting her California PI license and setting up her agency. When life gives her lemons, Poppy buys some vodka and makes a Vodka Collins! Heather, Matt, Iris and Violet are all characters ripe for exploration in future entries in this series.
Poppy Harmon Investigates is perfect for mystery readers of a certain age but others will also be amused by the gang’s shenanigans. It’s as if Stephanie Plum has aged 20 years, opened a detective agency but kept her zany wit. I can’t wait for the next book in the series. 5 stars!
Thanks to the publisher, Kensington Books, and NetGalley for an advanced copy.