A Christmas Peril

by J. A. Hennrikus

Overview

Sully Must Get Her Childhood Friend Off the Naughty List Before They're Both Scrooged

When Edwina "Sully" Sullivan's life imploded, she left behind her job on the police force and her unfaithful husband to start a new life as the general manager of her hometown theater, the Cliffside Theater Company.

For five years, she focused on budgets instead of crime and kept the Cliffside running alongside its mercurial artistic director. But when her childhood friend is suspected of killing his father, no one is looking for another culprit. So, in between keeping A Christmas Carol on budget and Scrooge sober, Sully dusts off her investigative skills to find a murderer. Her two lives collide when her ex-husband arrives on the scene to play lawyer and she's forced to confront her past in order to save her present.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780738754154
Publisher:	Llewellyn Worldwide, LTD.
Publication date:	09/08/2017
Series:	A Theater Cop Mystery , #1
Pages:	288
Product dimensions:	5.20(w) x 7.90(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

J. A. Hennrikus is the author of the Theater Cop Mystery series. As Julianne Holmes, she writes the Agatha-nominated Clock Shop Mystery series for Berkley Prime Crime. Hennrikus blogs with the Wicked Cozy Authors, is on the board of Sisters in Crime, and is a member of Mystery Writers of America. She is also an arts administrator who lives in Massachusetts. 

Editorial Reviews

10/15/2017
Edwina "Sully" Sullivan, forced to retire from the police department, returned to her small hometown of Trevorton, MA, to care for her dying father. Having left behind her unfaithful husband with the job, Sully is at loose ends when her father dies, so she decides to stay on in Trevorton as the general manager of the local theater. They're rehearsing for a performance of A Christmas Carol when powerful businessman Peter Whitehall is killed. Trying to exonerate the victim's son, Sully must brush off her detecting skills. VERDICT Hennrikus, aka Julianne Holmes (Chime and Punishment), delivers a promising series launch; the intriguing premise of a cop-turned-theater manager is bound to attract cozy aficionados seeking something different from the usual run of pet and culinary mysteries. Tough and independent Sully will also appeal to fans of Sue Grafton's Kinsey Millhone.

Library Journal

2017-06-20
Ex-cop Edwina "Sully" Sullivan struggles to keep a ragtag theater company afloat while working with her ex-husband to solve a murder in this series debut from Hennrikus, who's also written as Julianne Holmes (Clock and Dagger, 2016, etc.).Orphaned, divorced, and sidelined from the force, Sully's returned to her hometown, a picturesque Massachusetts coastal community, to manage a local theater company. To make ends meet during the off season, the troupe is performing A Christmas Carol, but the big-name star brought in as Scrooge to boost ticket sales is too drunk to learn his cues. In the midst of the chaos, Sully learns that a distant relation has died. Peter Whitehall was rich, powerful, and ruthless, so it's no great wonder that someone wanted to kill him. What's surprising is that they shot him in his own study, and security camera footage indicates that the murderer could only have been a member of the Whitehall household. Desperate to keep the matter in the family, Peter's daughter Emma asks Sully to take the case. The new Whitehall family lawyer is Sully's ex-husband, Gus, and he looks as good to her as ever. The two of them work together to uncover embezzling and crack the case even after their top suspect turns up dead, because, of course, the show must go on. Despite its title, blessedly light on the holiday trimmings. But the backstage antics, the second-act romance, the hard-boiled back story, the family drama, and the tourist-town backdrop are too many disparate elements that never gel. Unsatisfying and forgettable.

Kirkus Reviews