Hot Spot: A Mark Manning Mystery

by Michael Craft

Overview

During his distinguished career as a journalist, Mark Manning has seen it all--riots, murder, political corruption, and every manifestation of the dark heart of the human species. But even his proven emotional resources will be stretched when the home he shares with his lover, architect Neil Waite, and his ward and nephew, Thad Quatrain, becomes the site of one of the most daunting, taxing, and potentially dangerous of all human rituals--a wedding.

Roxanne Exner, best friend to both Mark and Neil, is having her nuptial ceremony at their house in the normally bucolic Dumont, Wisconsin, partly because Carl Creighton, her husband to be, is in the final weeks of his campaign for lieutenant governor of Illinois. For Roxanne, Dumont will afford some needed distance from the campaign, and for the city of Dumont, it will be the social event of the season. The wedding, despite everyone's fears, comes off with nary a hitch. The reception, however, takes a disastrous turn when a local matron, who happens to be a major donor to the campaign of Creighton's rival, is killed in what appears to be a freak electrical mishap.

Authorities soon discover that the electrocution was no accident. Then another shocker--Roxanne herself becomes the prime suspect. If Roxanne is ever to enjoy her honeymoon, and if Carl and his running mate are to stand a chance of election, Mark finds himself in a race against the clock to solve a most perplexing murder.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781466828629
Publisher:	St. Martin''s Publishing Group
Publication date:	06/04/2003
Series:	Mark Manning Mysteries , #6
Sold by:	Macmillan
Format:	NOOK Book
Pages:	288
Sales rank:	716,274
File size:	327 KB

About the Author

Michael Craft is the author of several previous mystery novels. He splits his time between Palm Springs, California and his home in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

Michael Craft is the author of several novels, three of which were honored as national finalists for Lambda Literary Awards. Craft and his partner reside in Wisconsin, which is the setting for the Mark Manning novels. They have a second home in the Palm Springs area of California, which provides the backdrop for Craft's series featuring theater director Claire Gray.

Table of Contents

Editorial Reviews

In Michael Craft's sixth solid Mark Manning mystery, Hot Spot, the Dumont, Wis., journalist and his lover, architect Neil Waite, are honored to act as witnesses at the wedding of Roxanne Exner, best friend to them both, and Carl Creighton, Democratic candidate for lieutenant governor of Illinois. But when an electric shock at the reception that kills a major donor to Creighton's campaign turns out to be no accident, Mark faces the daunting task of clearing the name of the chief murder suspect-the bride-in this engaging whodunit.

Publishers Weekly

Mark Manning's (Name Games) small-town home becomes the center of media attention when it hosts the wedding reception for his best friend, Roxanne, who plans to marry the Democratic candidate for governor of Illinois. Unfortunately, a suspicious death occurs at the reception, garnering even more publicity. For series fans and others. Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

Library Journal

It's a bittersweet wedding for Chicago attorney Roxanne Exner, since although she dearly loves Carl Creighton, the Democratic Illinois deputy attorney general now running for lieutenant governor, she's still pining for both the highly inaccessible Wisconsin friends who are hosting the event and giving her away, Dumont Daily Register publisher Mark Manning and his life partner, architect Neil Waite. The politically connected guests at the ceremony raise the temperature even more. Local philanthropist Betty Gifford Ashton, 80, invited at the request of Roxanne's law-school mentor, who's tying the knot, is escorted by Blain Gifford, the nephew who's managing the campaign of Republican gubernatorial candidate Raymond Gifford, Mrs. Ashton's cousin. Tensions are already running high when the elderly matriarch keels over, the victim of an accidental electrocution that looks anything but accidental-and that swiftly implicates Roxanne. When Carl's running mate indicates his plans to drop Carl from the ticket unless his bride is exonerated, Mark (Boy Toy, 2000, etc.) suddenly finds that he has only 48 hours to sort through an unusually rich crop of suspects, from the caterers whose marital difficulties seem suspicious to Blain Gifford, an opportunistic homophobe who could be gay himself, to Carl's daughter Lauren, whose scorching lack of affection for her new stepmother just might have boiled over to another target. Beneath Craft's trademark gay-rights updates is another sly retro puzzler complete with formal gatherings, understated gossip, half a dozen red herrings, and clues by the bushel. The best of Mark's six cases to date.

Kirkus Reviews

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