The Crossword Murder
(Nero Blanc)
With so many people writing murder mysteries these days, it helps authors to attract readers? attention and gain an audience if their books have a hook, something they can use to distinguish themselves from the competition. Nero Blanc, a pseudonym of Cordelia Frances Biddle and Steve Zettler, has come up with crossword puzzles as the hook for their book?The Crossword Murder.They have definitely come up with an unusual format for telling a story. Those who love doing crossword puzzles should especially get a kick out of the book, for it includes not one but five actual puzzles. What?s more, the puzzles are integral to the story itself. (Yes, completed puzzles do appear at the very end of the book. But, who would want to cheat and look ahead at the answers before finishing reading the mystery itself???)Like many entries in the genre, Blanc?s book features a private detective. His name is Rosco Polycrates and he has a couple of quirks which distinguish him from other private eyes. For example, he gets seasick very easily, even though he lives in a city on the water. And, for some reason, he refuses to wear socks. In short, he?s no Joe Friday. Actually he decided to call it quits with being a police officer because he couldn?t tolerate any longer all the bureaucratic restrictions placed on him.In his sixth year as a private detective, he?s called upon to investigate the death of a newspaper crossword puzzle writer. And that?s where the fun begins, for it turns out that, suspecting he was about to meet his day of judgment, the writer had actually constructed a series of puzzles, to be published in the paper, identifying his killer.Blanc succeeds in presenting a lively story, with likeable characters, in an intriguing setting in The Crossword Murder. It augurs well for Blanc enjoying much success in the murder mystery genre.
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