"Hilariously outrageous cozy mystery featuring former spy turned Girl Scout Troop leader"
Reviewed by Debbie Wiley
Posted April 26, 2022
Mystery Cozy | Mystery Woman Sleuth
Taking the Girl Scout group to Louisiana for a Mardi Gras celebration isn’t one of Merry Wrath’s better ideas. However, Merry isn’t known for great ideas as her Girl Scout group is known for their ingenuity and trouble-making ideas, never mind that one of her 11-year-old members is now the mayor of their town, Who’s There, Iowa. Merry’s co-leader, Kelly Albers, protests the idea and so the troop instead heads to their sister city, Who Dat, in Louisiana for Spring Break and Mardi Gras. Merry knows the trip will have difficulties because she knows her troop, but she senses something else is amiss with Who Dat. Now, Merry is accused of murder and it’s up to her and her friends to uncover the real murderer in a town full of secrets.
MARDI GRAS MURDER is the 22nd book in the Merry Wrath Mysteries but can be read as a standalone. However, I suspect that once readers get a taste for the humorous antics of this ex-spy and her trouble-making Girl Scouts, they will want to read the whole series! The story is full of hilariously outrageous antics, particularly by Girl Scout member, Betty, and I hope when Betty grows up she gets a series of her own.
I’m still laughing over some of the situations in MARDI GRAS MURDER! Whether it’s Princess Pelican, Tarzan, or the room full of taxidermy, every moment in MARDI GRAS MURDER has humor infused within the mystery. Leslie Langtry throws out red herrings galore as Merry tries to untangle what the heck is going on and who is behind the murders. I love all the references to the outrageous incidents in Merry’s past almost as much as I love Betty!
And oh, Betty! What can I say other than this girl is already a devious handful! Her mind is primed for the spy world and not even Merry can get anything past Merry. Betty rallies the troop around her misadventures, leaving me laughing even as I question her parents and how they handle her. And yes, Leslie Langtry even throws some hints about that as well in MARDI GRAS MURDER.
MARDI GRAS MURDER is the latest installment in the hilariously outrageous but oh so addict Merry Wrath Mysteries. Readers who love their cozy mysteries on the quirky side will relish the antics of Merry and her trouble-making Girl Scout Troop. I look forward to seeing what these ambitious girls and their ex-spy leader will get into next!
SUMMARY
From USA Today bestselling author Leslie Langtry comes the next laugh-out-loud Merry Wrath Mystery!
Let the good times roll!
It’s Spring Break, and ex-CIA agent Merry Wrath decides to take her precocious scout troop to a small town in Louisiana for Mardi Gras. Who Dat, LA is Who's There, Iowa’s sister city, so naturally the whole town turns out to greet them with carriage rides, a swamp tour, and a cake party. Unfortunately for them, someone isn’t happy they’re in town…
Bring the big guns—we’ll have some fun on the bayou!
Strange stories of a local half-gator/half-man, a weird ritual at a voodoo queen’s grave, and a tea room filled with taxidermy make Who Dat seem like it’s another planet, but Merry’s gut tells her there’s something unnervingly familiar about this town. Southern hospitality gives way to suspicion when two people are murdered and Merry was the last to see them alive. Is the killer really a vampire, like the police believe? What is their Bed and Breakfast host hiding in the locked third floor? How is Merry going to explain to the girls that they can’t name the pelican that follows them around Deep Throat?
Merry doesn’t have any answers, but when someone close to her is arrested, and a dangerous threat is revealed, she has to find the killer quickly, before Fat Tuesday becomes Fatal Tuesday!
ExcerptCHAPTER ONE
"You're joking." Kelly's eyebrows went up. "Please tell me you're joking and we aren't seriously considering taking a bunch of little girls to Louisiana for Mardi Gras."
"What's wrong with that idea?" I asked as we lay plastic tarps wall-to-wall on the floor. "They're in fifth grade now. It would be educational for them to see a different part of the country…try some new food and culture…take a swamp tour to see alligators…"
Kelly stopped taping the plastic sheets together. "Alligators? How is it possible that you've made this trip even more dangerous?"
I waved her off. "Thousands of tourists do that every year and almost no one dies."
My best friend and co-leader gave me one of those looks. "Almost? You want those kinds of odds with our troop?"
Hmmm…now that I thought of it, I wondered if there was a hotline phone number I could call to warn Louisiana about Betty? Something like their hurricane warning system perhaps?
"Look," I explained as she went back to sealing the plastic to cover the carpet, "it's not my fault the school has spring break so early that it coincides with Mardi Gras."
"It's the school district's fault?" Kelly shook her head. "And I was just about to nominate you for Responsible Leader of the Year."
I almost dropped my roll of duct tape. "What? That's a thing? I want it!"
Kelly has been on me for years about my alleged lack of responsibility. Stop teaching kindergarteners how to throw knives…no, we can't train second graders in sniper camouflage techniques at day camp…of course we shouldn't teach third grade girls how to make plastique using everyday items…no, there isn't a badge for identifying all terrorist groups listed in the CIA World Factbook. Seriously, Kelly was such a wet blanket sometimes.
I threw my arms in the air. "The girls love stuff like that! What kind of leader would I be if I didn't prepare them for life in the real world?"
"You're preparing them for a life of black ops and wet work," Kelly said evenly.
"What if they ever want to travel to Syria or Chechnya?" I countered. "Knowing how to fend off an attacker with a sparkly princess unicorn barrette is far more responsible in my opinion."
Maybe I could get Betty to hack into the Girl Scout Council's mainframe to make me a shoo-in for this Responsible Leader award.
"This is a terrible idea." Kelly shook her head. "I'm tempted not to go with you."
My stomach dropped. How could I possibly do this without my responsible, grown-up, former ER nurse co-leader? Who's going to be there for alligator bites?
Kelly continued, "Of course, then you'd have to find someone else, which would serve you right."
"There's Rex," I thought out loud. "Or Riley, or Soo Jin, I guess. Maybe Ron and Ivan would go."
Hmmm…my Chechen brothers-in-law might be a good option as far as protecting Louisiana from my troop. And while they could be a pain in the butt, they were fun…
Kelly read my mind. "That would be more fun than you deserve."
"How about Hilly?" I pulled out my cell phone. "You know what? You're right. Hilly would be great on this trip!"
Hilly Vinton was a friend and colleague, who was also a CIA assassin. Of course she's not a CIA assassin—the CIA doesn't have assassins because that would be illegal. Okay, now that I've gotten past the disclaimer…Hilly totally is an assassin. Kelly never really warmed to her because Hilly embraced my ideas and even taught the girls how to kill a man with one finger. Well, we practiced it on dummies, not real people, because that would be wrong. I
thought for sure I had her with this idea, but Kelly didn't budge. She looked nervous but seemed to be sticking to her refusal. Time to bring out the big guns.
"Maybe Robert, could go with me?" I asked innocently, knowing bringing her husband and daughter into the mix would change her mind. "He'd probably love a break, and you and Finn would be alone together for a week for bonding."
Kelly blanched. Her little girl, my goddaughter, was in her terrible toddler phase with a capital TERRIBLE and was driving Kelly crazy with her Kim Jong-un-sized tantrums. Personally, I was impressed with the decibel range the tiny human could produce. Most people don't know this, but the Soviets experimented with this kind of thing as a torture mechanism. They locked innocent people in a room with a screaming toddler for two hours. Every single one of them confessed to stuff they hadn't done, just to get out. Of course, then the Soviets sent them to gulags for the crimes they didn't really do.
"I'll do it," Kelly said finally. "But not because of my daughter, but because I would be worried sick about the girls."
I did an endzone dance in my head. "Okay, so now we have to put plastic on the walls." I pointed to the beige carpet. "Because if we aren't careful, it'll be impossible to get the red out and I'll have to repaint the walls."
Kelly sighed. "We never should've agreed to paint valentine-themed bird houses."
I was inclined to agree. "But we already told them yes. We even pinky swore."
The pinky swear was an absolutely unbreakable bond. It ranked right up there with CIA nondisclosure agreements and absolutely any promise made in Turkmenistan on Lifetime Promise with No Backsies Under Pain of Death Day. Yeah, it's as scary as it sounds, but they do have a nice festival with deep fried Ding Dongs, so it's worth going at least once.
My name is Merry Wrath, and I used to be a field agent for the CIA, until the Vice President "accidentally" outed me on CNN when I was embedded with the Chechens. After surviving a mad dash across several unfriendly countries and narrowly avoiding an armed chicken, I moved back to my small, Iowa hometown of Who's There, where my best friend decided we should start a Girl Scout troop. In fact, we were getting ready for a troop meeting at my old house, which was across the street from the house I now shared with my husband, Rex.
Currently, six elderly hermits we'd found at an old scout camp were staying here. But even if no one was in residence, I'd still keep the house because it was where I hid all of my CIA toys, like exploding tampon boxes and packs of gum where the sticks of gum were actually heat-seeking missiles.
"Why aren't we setting this up tomorrow?" Kelly wondered.
"Because we can since the ladies are out of town, visiting Disney World," I explained. "And tomorrow morning I have to take Philby to the vet." I pointed to the wall. "You missed a spot."
"I don't get it." Rex shook his head when I informed him of our plans. "Why do you think it's a good idea to go to Mardi Gras with your troop?"
"You don't have to worry about them," I insisted, hoping it would be true.
"I'm worried about New Orleans after Hurricane Betty," Rex said. "
She's not that bad," I lied. Of course she was. The kid was terrifying.
Rex scratched behind Philby's ears. My obese cat who resembled Hitler was demanding attention, like she always did by smacking his arm whenever he stopped.
"What's the purpose of this trip? Mardi Gras is hardly appropriate for little girls."
After almost messing up with Kelly, I'd come up with a better argument. "Ava wants to visit our sister city—Who Dat. It's in Louisiana, so I thought we'd hit Baton Rouge and NOLA. Have them experience Cajun and creole culture. We don't have anything like that here in Iowa."
It was true. Louisiana was an eclectic and diverse state with French, German, Spanish, Italian, Cajun, and Creole heritage, culture, celebrations, and food. In Iowa, mayo was our most exotic condiment. Instead of alligators and swamps, we had pigs and cornfields. The closest thing we had to voodoo was when the Methodist Altar Committee once tried to bring Mavis Winter's kitten back from the dead. They were actually doing chest compressions on the altar, and it turned out the cat was just sleeping. But the Lutheran Ladies for the Wholesome have referred to them as Those Methodist Voodoo Satanists ever since.
"And," I continued, "it's educational since Betty is obsessed with Huey Long— that extremely crooked Louisiana governor from almost one hundred years ago. We can visit the capitol building where he was assassinated."
Rex stifled a smile. "Okay, okay. Just don't let her bring that kind of thinking back here. The last thing I need is to investigate the mayor's right-hand kid on corruption charges for taking bribes from the Pork Producers."
Yay! Now I just had to brief Ava on the plan she knew nothing about. Ava was our town's eleven-year old mayor. My troop's go-getter who dreamed of running a major international insurance company someday, she was beyond ambitious and as tough as they came. The girl had been mayor for a few months now and was doing a pretty good job. She'd doubled Rex's budget and made three of the five councilpersons cry. Her rival, town councilman Jeff Dodd, threw everything he could at the girl in hopes of intimidating her, but nothing worked.
That was mostly due to her unflappable nature, but also due to her chief of security and unofficial black ops leader, Betty. Betty was the troop's troublemaker, and she was awesome. This kid was going to make one kickass CIA Director someday, probably before she was thirty. The problem was, you couldn't be that badass and just coast on it. Her parents had been thinking of sending her to boarding school in Texas, but Ava had granted a charter to Carol Anne's pet project – Helpful Hands & Tentacles—a sort of Welcome Wagon for aliens.
For years Carol Anne had insisted she'd been kidnapped by sentient beings from outer space, who, foregoing the usual probing, taught her instead to play the bassoon. She wasn't half bad and could pull off a mean Pink Panther Theme at parties.
Ava secured Betty's stay by hiring Betty's dad, Roderick, as the town's Director of Garbage Collection at twice what he was making as an appliance salesman. Some town council members questioned the move, considering that Roderick had no experience whatsoever. But Ava announced that anyone against the idea obviously hated puppies, and she won. Huey Long, the most corrupt and popular Louisiana governor of all time, would be proud.
And so was I. I just didn't tell Kelly that, because as far as I was concerned, I was up for the possibly not real Responsible Leader of the Year now, and I wasn't taking any chances.
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