In the seventh book in the Domestic Equalizers series, I CAN'T MAKE YOU LOVE ME, BUT I CAN MAKE YOU LEAVE, has-been country music star Darla Denman is ready to make a comeback. She's just about broke, and the best gigs she's been able to get include a telethon taking place in Midland, Texas. When her tour bus breaks down just outside of Salt Lick (a fictional town near the very real Midland), Darla meets Edwina and Debbie Sue, two hair stylists who have found themselves in the middle of so much crime that under the sign for the Styling Station -- the shop is in a defunct gas station -- they have placed a sign for the Domestic Equalizers detective agency. Darla approaches the detecting duo about appearing in the show as back-up dancers after the ones that had been on the bus take off, but she turns out to need their help in far more serious matters when Roxie Denman, Darla's opening act and her agent/ex-husband's current wife winds up dead on her dressing room floor, making Darla the obvious suspect.

Cash -- the pseudonym for two collaborating sisters who both live in Texas -- writes with energy and enthusiasm, and humor abounds as the plot bounces between the mystery and the various characters' relationships with husbands and ex-es. Most of the characters are likable, especially the two detectives who are well developed, with a solid friendship, despite being two very different people. However, what we see of Roxie, who is cold and cruel, makes it hard to care that she's been murdered or to have a desire to see her killer come to justice. You keep reading, though, because you want to see how Debbie Sue and Edwina are going to get Darla out of jail, and because the writing pulls you along.