Cash Kills by Nanci Rathbun Guest Post & Giveaway

Cash Kills
by Nanci Rathbun

Angie is a believable blend of tough stuff and compassion, and uses both for her clients. But just like organizing all the dishes to a huge Thanksgiving dinner, Nanci Rathbun stirs up tension and keeps us licking our chops for the final sit-down.
~The Editing Pen

Cash Kills: An Angelina Bonaparte Mystery
Cozy Mystery
2nd in Series
Paperback: 258 pages
Publisher: Cozy Cat Press (June 3, 2014)
ISBN-10: 1939816440
ISBN-13: 978-1939816443

Synopsis:

When her office mate, accountant Susan Neh, brings Angelina Bonaparte a client named Adriana Johnson, the PI wonders how she can help this bedraggled young woman.   Adriana’s parents, immigrants from the former Yugoslavia, were murdered only a week earlier, in a robbery at their small hardware store. Now she has discovered that, despite living like the working poor, they were actually quite wealthy––with numerous large bank accounts located around the world.  Adriana is suspicious about her newfound status and hires Angie to discover the nature of her deceased parents’ wealth.  When Angie arrives to interview with the parents’ attorney, Herman Petrovitch, he is missing, but his secretary Dragana is there––lying dead on the office floor, with her head blown off.  Homicide detective––and Angie’s own boyfriend––Ted Wukowski, cautions her against getting involved in the murder investigation.  Of course, Angie pays little heed to his warning.

About This Author

Nanci Rathbun is a lifelong reader of mysteries – historical, contemporary, futuristic, paranormal, hard-boiled, cozy … you can find them all on her bookshelves.  She brings logic and planning to her writing from a background as an IT project manager, and attention to characters and dialog from her second career as a Congregationalist minister. Her first novel, Truth Kills: An Angelina Bonaparte Mystery, is out in both paperback and ebook formats. The first chapter is available free on her web site and on her Goodreads page. Cash Kills is the second book in the series. Number three has a working title of Deception Kills, with plans to publish in 2015.

Nanci is a longtime Wisconsin resident who relocated to Tennessee to be closer to her granddaughters – oh, and their parents – and is planning an upcoming move to the West Coast for the same reason. No matter where she lives, she will always be a Packers fan.

Author Links

Webpage: http://nancirathbun.com

Facebook: Author Nanci Rathbun

Twitter: @nancirathbun

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7199317.Nanci_Rathbun

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Nanci-Rathbun/e/B00E9E7QCI

Purchase Links:
Amazon B&N

First Book in the Series

Purchase from Amazon or B&N

Guest Post:

Defining the Detective

Authors are quite often asked to name their top five or ten favorite books or authors. I struggle with that. My tastes are very eclectic. I read a lot – some might say too much, but I don’t think that’s possible! – and I find enjoyment in many different kinds of books. The mystery, though, is my first and most pervasive love. You can find almost every type of mystery on my shelves, or loaded on one of my two ereaders. There are mysteries from the Classic Age, historicals, contemporaries, paranormals, westerns … you name it, I probably have one of those subgenres. Small wonder that I am a writer of mysteries!

I love getting into the detective’s head and following him or her as the plot unfolds. Can I deduce the identity of the murderer before it is revealed? Before the detective understands the motive? Not often, but it’s fun to make the effort.

There are so many great detectives in mystery fiction! I’m drawn to characters who must overcome personal obstacles. Charlaine Harris’ Sookie Stackhouse is an outcast in her small Louisiana community, due to her ability to “hear” what others are thinking. Will Thomas’ Richard Llewellyn went to prison for a crime he didn’t commit. Each of them struggles to find acceptance in society. This gives the mysteries they’re involved in depth. Most of us can relate to feeling out of place or misunderstood from time to time. In my series, Angie faces her father’s disapproval of her occupation. Private detection is no job for a woman, her Sicilian-American papa protests. She must struggle against his unenlightened attitude, while keeping the family peace and respecting her only living parent.

I also enjoy a character who evolves. Sue Grafton’s Kinsey Millhone (I dread the day when Ms. Grafton reaches the end of the alphabet and decides to retire Kinsey) is not the quintessential loner she was at the beginning of the series. She has a strong bond with her octogenarian landlord Henry and his quirky family, and she’s taken baby steps to understand her long-estranged birth family. Angie’s evolved, too. Her cheating ex’s affairs made her reluctant to trust. Background checks were a regular part of her dating routine. In her new relationship with homicide detective Ted Wukowski, Angie is learning to stop immediately jumping to negative conclusions and to give and accept love. She still has a way to go in the trust department.

Then there’s humor. A smile or a laugh can get us through some of life’s dreariest times. That’s why we have “black humor” – sick jokes about subjects that should be off-limits to kidding around. The humor in a mystery doesn’t have to be overt to appeal. Raymond Chandler was a master at the wry remark. “She gave me a smile I could feel in my hip pocket,” or “It was a blonde. A blonde to make a bishop kick a hole in a stained glass window.” I don’t live up to Chandler standards – not many do – but I’ve created a wry statement or two, myself. Here’s one that a recent critic of Cash Kills liked, related to Angie’s short stature: “I raised the window and deftly slipped the Ram into the spot closest to the stairway. Just because you’re small, it doesn’t mean you can’t park with the big boys.”

While the lone hero (or antihero) has appeal, I like a mystery with a community of characters whom we get to know on more than a superficial level. Elizabeth Peters’ Amelia Peabody series is like that. Set in Egypt in late 1800s and early 1900s, her archeological mysteries include a wide group of people outside Amelia’s immediate family. After the birth of Amelia and Emerson’s son Walter, aka Ramses, the couple adopt Nefret, found in very mysterious circumstances, and David Todros, an abandoned orphan with artistic talent. And there’s Reis Abdullah, their foreman on Emerson’s digs in the Valley of the Kings, who gives his life to save Amelia and then continues in the series as a spirit guide in her dreams. Even Sethos, the Master Criminal (Peter’s caps, not mine), is an ongoing character whom we begin to understand and reluctantly appreciate. Community is an important element in mystery. Angie has hers, too. Papa and Aunt Terry. Bobbie Russell, who evolves into a sidekick and eventually a colleague. Mafia lawyer Bart Matthews. Even Angie’s cleaner (don’t call her a cleaning lady!) Lela, an actor who supports herself by taking on household gigs.

My list of admirable detective qualities is long, but I’ll end with this essential: integrity. I can’t get interested in a protagonist who has no code by which s/he lives. A vacillator or an opportunist is not someone I can identify with. Now, I can engage in a mystery where the lead character’s code is not congruent with mine. Thomas Perry’s Jane Whitefield is a Native American woman who helps people disappear when they are out of other options. The ones who come to her are not always admirable, but they are always desperate. Through Jane’s eyes, we see them as human and needy, as deserving of life despite their manifold failings. Jane is a consistent and engaging character who lives by her own peculiar code. Angie has a code, too. It’s embodied in the opening quote from Confucius in Truth Kills: “Hold faithfulness and sincerity as first principles.” Angie, like Sam Spade, will not be lied to, nor will she shield those who violate her trust.

So there you have it – a short list, and not an exhaustive one, of things I like in a good mystery detective.  What’s on your list?

Giveaway

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