Rita LakinReseñas
Autor de Getting Old is Murder
Reseñas
Getting Old Is Murder (Gladdy Gold) por Rita Lakin
The disaster referred to was a hurricane that devastated Ft Lauderdale, including the complex in which our protagonists live. Complications ensue!
And then there's the "Grandpa Bandit" who robs banks, and who has asked Gladdy and her cohort to catch him... not to mention the storm revealing an old murder with modern implications.
The "girls" have their hands full here!
It's pretty good. The mystery is OK- although I have some quibbles with the set-up: Where does Philip get the cash? How do assistd living facilities not notice his pretty distinct patter when they are processing his paperwork? Who's the chick in Europe? etc.
Also, split personalities do not work that way.
Anyway, the resolution left a lot of loose ends; I guess we'll see if future books address them. I know #4 does not.
And while I found Gladdy's sister tolerable in #4, even though she spent the whole book sulking, her behavior in this one was abominably narcissistic, complete with tantrums. Gladdy indulges her too much- while Gladdy is the elder sister, little sis is **73** and plenty old enough to behave with at least cursory decency.
All in all, this called a lot of the series's aspects into question, which made it less fun than it could have been.
I'll probably read the next 2, since I have them on hand, but I am getting less enthused about the series.
Various mysteries come up in this episode, but the main one is that Jack- Gladdy's maybe-SO- has returned to NYC to try to solve the murder of Gladdy's husband.
Things get complicated, especially when both Gladdy's and Jack's families meet and bond enthusiastically!
While there are some sad and heavy themes here, it's mostly light-hearted and at times almost farce-like in the best way. And at the end, Gladdy can lay a ghost to rest and be more open to the future.
Despite the occasion serious elements, these books are mostly pretty light and entertaining. I love the idea of a PI firm made of senior women! each with her own strengths, despite everything else.
I have a couple more novels in this series, and plan to read them.
The "girls" mean well, are but almost as much hindrance as help! They're well-depicted, though there are sufficient of them that I found it hard to keep a couple of them straight.
The mystery was solid and well-paced, with a plausible solution. And I hope the real-estate conspiracy has gotten nipped in the bud...
This is the first book in the series, and the second I've read. I enjoyed both enough to get a couple more in the series. It's probably best enjoyed by women of a certain age, however!
The characters are great- all are women of A Certain Age (here, in their 70s), with various aspects of their ages having an impact on their contributions. Gladdy- our protagonist- is the most sensible of them all- a responsibility she takes seriously.
I am not sure how plausible the central mystery is- but it works well in context.
If you want to expand your cozy mystery reading past the usual women in their 30s protagonists, I recommend this one! And I will be looking forward to reading more in the series.
Also recommended is her seven books in the Getting Old is Murder series. Sometimes, like women, older people get little respect. And these books are hilarious as well as being good mysteries
Esther's son, Alvin Ferguson, believes that his mother's lover murdered her. He's hiring Gladdy and her gladiators to look into it. His wife, Shirley, thinks it's a waste of money.
Said lover is moving from Grecian Villas to another luxury retirement hotel, Wilmington House. Gladdy and her sister, Evvie, go undercover as residents to find out if 'Romeo' is the sweet man Shirley thinks he is or the killer Alvin suspects. We already know, of course, so we have more reason that Gladdy to worry when Evvie starts falling for the movie-star handsome charmer.
The Peeping Tom subplot from book two is resolved in a manner satisfactory to all but the Peeper.
A new subplot is Dr. Friendly, whom gladiator Sophie Meyerbeer won't hear a word against, although her friends think he's a quack. The potential dangers of polypharmacy (being on 4 or more medications), not asking questions about a new medication, and not getting a second opinion are covered.
The grief therapy session in chapter 33 not only helps some characters, it gives us a glimpse into Gladdy's heart. Some of the reasons for grieving appear to take the group leader by surprise, but that doesn't make them invalid.
If you've been wondering if there's a reason other than her personality that Ida's family never calls or replies to her letters, wonder no more. (See chapter 42)
Once again, Gladdy and associates prove that age is no barrier to cracking a case.
Notes:
Chapter 21: 'The lady in Red' is a famous old song not to be confused with Chris de Burgh's song of the same title. If you don't remember it from classic Warner Brothers cartoons, here's a video from the movie in which it appeared: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3glSBmLk9A (enjoy the Busby Berkely choreography).
Chapter 24: Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb is a 1964 cult classic movie. That Sophie's friends are using the name for Dr. Friendly is a sign of how worried they are.
Chapter 25: Conchetta has a sister named Nina who has 3 daughters. They're hoping her new baby will be a boy. Here's also where we learn her Uncle Paco's wise advice.
Chapter 28: Sophie doesn't sing the first line of the third old song she sings snatches from here. That song is 'Buffalo Gals Won't You Come Out Tonight,' which Dad used to sing to us.
Chapter 49: Do you call 'soap operas' 'daytime serials'? I don't. In any case, producer Glory Hill's remark about soaps being about love and sex, not scaring...the viewers suggests she's forgotten about the original 'Dark Shadows' soap.
Gladdy already has nicknames for her business associates: Evvie is their female Sherlock Holmes, Ida is Miss Stubborn (which she amply proves she deserves), Bella she calls 'the Shadow,' and Sophie is their Master of Disguise (what, Gladdy thinks of them as her 'private eye-ettes and doesn't call Sophie a Mistress of Disguise?). Yeah, I'm a nitpicker.
In chapter 3, Gladdy describes herself and her two-years-younger sister, Evvie, explaining that she takes after their father and Evvie their mother. Chapter 10 is where Gladdy has the nightmare about her parents, the three maternal aunts who always gushed over Evvie and never her, with herself as eight years old and Evvie as six. When she wakes up, she tells the readers more about her family. It's in chapter 14 that we learn the names of Gladdy's grandchildren (Emily is her only child) and a bit about their interests. Elizabeth sent ballet sketches. Erin drew horses, which she loves. Pat sent cartoons of his own creation. Lindsay sent funny photos of her dogs and cats.
'Spite and Malice,' the two-person card game said to be Sophie and Ida's favorite when they're playing it on a stakeout in chapter nine, is a real game. It's also called 'Cat and Mouse' according to the site where I looked it up. (That stakeout scene is something else.)
Gladdy's romance with handsome widower Jack Langford isn't progressing as quickly as Jack would like. (Loved the question his son Morrie asks about her intentions.) Her sister and friends are still good at driving her crazy even though she loves them. Push really comes to shove when Gladdy has to decide between a getaway with Jack and a cruise with the girls.
If it seems there are just too many coincidences that allow Gladdy to piece the puzzle together, Gladdy herself has an explanation in chapter 48. The cruise itself provides plenty of fun scenes and action. Jack is trying to help Gladdy embrace 21st century technology. Good luck. A subplot mystery may be being left for the next book or the fact that it will be solved is implied in this one. I like this series.
Gladdy should be reading Donna Andrews' Meg Langslow mysteries. She's a lot like an elderly version of Meg -- the sensible, organized one who gets stuck with the responsibility of the moment. Unlike Meg, though, only one of the persons expecting her to take responsibility is a relative. Evvie (Evelyn) is Gladdy's younger sister. Most of the other characters live in the same or one of the other buildings in their condominium complex. Their crazy-making personalities provide humor for readers who don't have to put up with them.
We are thoughtfully provided with a map of buildings P & Q of Lanai Gardens, a cast of characters, and Gladdy's Glossary of the Yiddish that's used in the book. (I wish a pronunciation guide had been included with that last one.)
The prologue and some of the chapters are italicized glimpses into the victims' final minutes, as well as the mind of a suspect. If not for Gladdy, those would have passed off as natural deaths. All of the victims were over 70. Two leave best friends to mourn and one was almost universally beloved, the kind of person who makes his/her bit of the world a little better for those around.
There are plenty of 'characters' among the characters. One of them is a widow who raids the dumpsters and paints or soaps verses that take mean little digs at Lanai Gardens residents. Some of them provide subplots, such as the husband unwilling to admit that his beloved wife's Alzheimer's is worse enough that he can no longer care for her by himself. There's also a survivor of the Holocaust. She and her late husband both lost their entire families in the death camps. Enya is still haunted by the horrors she suffered.
On the brighter side, Gladdy has two friends at her local branch library: Conchetta the head librarian and Barney, one of the employees. Even nicer, unlike Jane Marple and Maud Silver, Gladdy gets to have a possible romance with a handsome widower. His first name is the same as her late husband's. Given her annoyance with her memory failing to yield all the words she wants when she wants them, that's a real plus.
If not for my annotated volumes of Sherlock Holmes, I wouldn't have realized that the phrase about the game being afoot comes from the movies, so I can't fault Gladdy for not clarifying that in chapter 45. However, she is old enough to know that 'the proof is in the pudding' is a corruption of 'the proof of the pudding is in the eating,' so I was annoyed when she used that phrase in chapter 16. (It's a handy thing to know in case some kid asks you why the proof is in the pudding. Sure beats trying to come up with a reason, doesn't it?)
As for the chapter decoration of a fly-swatter over a rolling pin over a plunger, don't worry. It will be explained.
I think I shall have to check out some more Gladdy Gold.
It was very light, funny and uncomplicated. Gladdy Gold had just returned from a double honeymoon with her sister, Evvie. Gladdy wants her husband to join the detective agency that she has. But Ida complains that it wouldn’t be the same with Jack in the group. She thought that meant, no more shopping together, no more snacks in the middle of the night and in general, it just wouldn’t be the same. So Ida suggested that she, Sophie and Bella create a new detective agency with her name of course. The women figure out how to get to a two week detective training course. They also meet a new character, Rico, who I really hope is in the future books. The main case of the book involves a grudge held for fifty-five years by Arlene Simon against the person who stole her husband.
The two cases were not that complicated so what I enjoyed the most was the humor of the group and the villain in the first case. I also loved the characters so I hope to learn more about them in the other books in this series.
I highly recommend this cozy for its humor and uncomplicated story for all cozy fans.
75-year-old Gladdy Gold of the Lanai Gardens in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, finds herself a self-professed private investigator when her friends begin dying in very similar ways. Her credentials? More than thirty years of reading mysteries. (Works for me....)
Gladdy and the rest of her friends squeeze sleuthing into their daily round of poolside chatter, early-bird specials, and grocery shopping while one of their neighbors in Lanai Gardens, Greta Kronk, seems to be going out of her way to become Suspect #1.
This book contains both a cast of characters, which I didn't refer to after an amusing initial reading, and a glossary of Yiddish terms, which I found to be very useful. The identity of the killer seemed rather obvious to me, and the humor often fell flat.
Humor is very subjective. You may think Gladdy and her friends going shopping and dining and purposely driving sales clerks and waiters crazy is hilarious. I don't. I've spent almost all my working life in customer service dealing with people like this. If it's not purposely done, it's all right and I don't turn a hair. If people who can't seem to find anything better to do with their free time purposely come in to create as many problems as possible, steam starts leaking out of my ears. See? I told you my reason was very subjective!
If Getting Old Is Murder sounds like your cup of tea, enjoy! As for me, if I want to read about Senior Citizen Sleuths, I'd rather read something like Mike Befeler's Retirement Homes Are Murder.
"Getting Old is Criminal" is a unique mystery. Although it has some elements of a cozy mystery, especially in having a group of elderly women running a detective agency and solving mysteries, and has a humorous side plot about a flasher, it is a bit darker than traditional cozy mysteries. Also, this isn't much of a mystery since it's clear from the very beginning who the murderer is - the only real mystery is whether he'll be caught before he kills again. What makes the book worth reading is the characters. All of the characters are well written and believable, starting with Gladdy who is still in some ways mourning the death of her husband and a bit hesitant about starting a new relationship. While Jack wasn't in the book much, I wanted to shake some sense into him for the way that he was treating Gladdy. Evvie's part of the story is heartbreaking as she falls for the seemingly charming Philip, a development that not only threatens her relationship with Gladdy but her life. The other members of Gladdy's detective group are also well written, with the standout being Ida who begins to open up to Gladdy about her estranged relationship with her son and his family. As I mentioned earlier, it's not much of a surprise who the murderer is, but the reason why he killed struck me as a bit unbelievable.
"Getting Old is Criminal" is a good if unusual mystery.
I liked "Getting Old Is the Best Revenge" even better than the first book in the series. The characters continue to develop and we learn more about how Gladdy's husband died and why she is so hesitant in her relationship with Jack. Having Gladdy open a detective agency is a great move as it will give author Rita Lakin a good plot device to have Gladdy get involved in more murder investigations. Lakin does stretch a bit with Gladdy and the girls ending up on the same cruise ship as a murderer and befriending the intended victim, but the cruise is so much fun that readers will forgive her. The murder is well plotted and readers will have a hard time figuring out who the murderer is. Readers who are easily offended should be aware that there is a sexual overtone throughout the book.
This is an excellent cozy mystery.
"Getting Old is Murder" is a nice, humorous first entry in what looks to be an enjoyable cozy mystery series. Gladdy is a wonderful creation, very funny and still full of life (and romance) at 75. Her friends are all well written, with a nice touch of humor that makes them seem real but doesn't poke fun at the elderly. Each character stands out as an individual: the wisecracking Hy and his wife Lois; Gladdy's sister Evvie, a movie critic; Sophie with her slightly off-kilter cliches ("you're a broken record, play another"); Harriet who is young but lives there to take care of her elderly mother, Esther); Enya who never got over the loss of her family during the Holocaust; and Denny, the mentally slow handyman. Although the book is a cozy mystery and the elderly don't hesitate to solve the crime, it also shows the real problems of getting old, especially in the bittersweet case of Irving struggling to take care of his wife who has Alzheimer's. All of these characters are well written and come alive on the page.
The mystery itself is nicely done with some neat red herrings and when the murderer is finally revealed, there is a real motive behind the slayings. There are some minor flaws - Francie's death is well telegraphed (it's never a good sign when the heroine in a mystery wonders what she'd do if something happened to her best friend!). There's also some minor editing errors, such as when Gladdy remembers dropping a friend off at the dentist when she never did so. Not a major error, but enough to stop the flow of the story for a second or two. Rita Lakin takes you into the victim's minds as they are dying, which I found unsettling in a cozy mystery.
But these are indeed minor flaws and this is a very enjoyable, funny cozy mystery. It's worth buying just to read the scene in which Gladdy convinces a gang of teenagers to help her break into her car after she locks her keys in it. One of the funniest scenes I've ever read!
“Getting Old is to Die For” is the fourth book in Rita Lakin’s Gladdy Gold mystery series and it is the best one so far. While Gladdy and her elderly but intrepid gang (her sister Evvie, Ida, Bella, and Sophie) do use their detective skills to solve a case in Florida, most of the book takes place in New York and focuses on Jack’s attempt to find out who killed Gladdy’s husband (also named Jack). This works wonderfully since readers get to meet both Gladdy’s and Jack’s families, which helps develop them even more as characters. The New York scenes are excellently done and I could feel my mouth water as Lakin described some of the delis Gladdy and Jack went into.
While this series really can’t be considered a cozy mystery series, it is not hardboiled either. There are some genuinely tragic moments (the way Gladdy’s husband died) and some very sad moments (a case Gladdy and the girls investigate in Florida and the way her husband’s death affected several people). But Lakin does inject some humor in the book when Ida, Bella, and Sophie visit New York. Their reason for visiting there wasn’t very believable nor is anything that happens to them there believable, but it is very funny – something that is welcome in a series that can be a little depressing at times.
“Getting Old is to Die For” is a nice entry in a series that improves with each book. The first three books in the series are “Getting Old is Murder”, “Getting Old is the Best Revenge”, and “Getting Old is Criminal”. Enjoy!
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