In this fast-paced mystery by Rita Mae Brown and her feline
co-author Sneaky Pie Brown, Mary Minor “Harry” Haristeen and
her animal friends seek to solve a whodunit rooted in
eighteenth-century Virginia—uncovering a shocking secret
that refuses to stay buried.
TALL
TAIL
At any moment a perfect summer day
in Crozet, Virginia—nestled within the Blue Ridge
Mountains—might turn stormy and tempestuous, as Harry knows
too well when a squall suddenly sweeps in. In a blink,
Harry’s pickup nearly collides with a careening red car that
then swerves into a ditch. Harry recognizes the dead driver
slumped over the vehicle’s steering wheel: Barbara Leader
was nurse and confidante to former Virginia governor Sam
Holloway.
Though Barbara’s death is ruled a
heart attack, dissenting opinions abound. After all, she was
the picture of health, which gives Harry and her four-legged
companions pause. A baffling break-in at a local business
leads Harry to further suspect that a person with malevolent
intent lurks just out of sight: Something evil is afoot.
As it happens, Barbara died in the shadow of the
local cemetery’s statue of the Avenging Angel. Just below
that imposing funereal monument lie the remains of one
Francisco Selisse, brutally murdered in 1784. Harry’s
present-day sleuthing draws her back to Virginia’s
slave-holding past and the hunt for Selisse’s killer. Now
it’s up to Harry and her furry detectives—Mrs. Murphy,
Pewter, and Tee Tucker—to expose the bitter truth, even if
it means staring into the unforgiving eyes of history and
cornering a callous killer poised to pounce.