The Musubi Murder

by Frankie Bow

Overview

If you like your cozy mysteries with humor and a satisfying dose of sarcasm, Frankie Bow is your go-to author.
Laura's Interests Book Blog

Newly single and far from home, Professor Molly Barda wants to stay out of trouble until she gets tenure at remote Mahina State University. But when local big-shot Jimmy Tanaka, "The Most Hated Man in Hawaii," pledges a huge donation to Molly's college and then disappears, Molly's bottom-line-obsessed dean tasks her with locating the missing mogul. As Molly explores ancient grudges and uncovers old scandals, she starts to fall for Tanaka's competitor, the too-good-to-be-true Donnie Gonsalves. Donnie seems to like her for all the wrong reasons--and has a few secrets of his own.

The Musubi Murder is for
mystery lovers
Hawaii expatriates
disillusioned academics
anyone who fancies Spam (the meat)
What is a Musubi (pronounced moo-soo-BEE)?

The Spam musubi, Hawaii's favorite snack and Merrie Musubis' signature dish, is a cube of sticky rice topped with a slice of fried Spam, and then wrapped in a strip of dried seaweed. From a distance, musubis look a lot like oversized pieces of sushi.

If you like Dorothy Parker, Sarah Caudwell, P.G. Wodehouse, and E.F. Benson's Mapp and Lucia stories, try the Molly Barda Mysteries.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781943476541
Publisher:	Frankie Bow
Publication date:	01/23/2017
Series:	Professor Molly Mysteries , #1
Pages:	336
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.75(d)

About the Author

Like Professor Molly, Frankie Bow teaches at a public university. Unlike her protagonist, Frankie is blessed with delightful students, sane colleagues, and a perfectly nice office chair. She believes if life isn't fair, at least it can be entertaining. In addition to writing murder mysteries, she publishes in scholarly journals under her real name. Her experience with academic publishing has taught her to take nothing personally. Sign up for news of releases, giveaways, and events at http: //bit.ly/BowNews

Editorial Reviews

06/08/2015
Professor Molly Barda, the narrator of the pseudonymous Bow’s winning first mystery, is pursuing tenure at Hawaii’s Mahina State University. The academic politics of Mahina are tougher than most, but Molly plays the game quietly until guest of honor Jimmy Tanaka, the owner of the Merrie Musubi fast-food chain and a potential major donor to Mahina, fails to show for a big reception at the school cafeteria. Molly unwillingly enters a search for Tanaka, and in the process finds herself falling for the man’s competitor, Donnie Gonsalves, the owner of Donnie’s Drive-Inns. Amid faculty grudges and unpopular student retention policies, Molly searches for the key to not just the missing Musubi mogul but a nasty killing. Bow, who teaches at a public university, uses wry humor to alleviate the horror of her heroine’s situation and is familiar enough with island culture to know the popularity of Musubi rice balls with a heart of Spam. (Aug.)

Publishers Weekly

07/01/2015
Molly Barda is a faculty member at Mahina State University, teaching at the College of Commerce in Hawaii. All she wants to do is lay low and work until she is granted tenure. Fast-food guru Jimmy Tanaka makes a donation to the college but fails to show up for the ceremony. Nobody can find him. Old secrets, long-standing grudges, and murder are on the menu. This humorous debut makes entertaining use of the local patois. Anyone who has ever labored on a college campus will recognize the place and its resident academic egos. VERDICT Certain to appeal to readers who love well-drawn settings or academic cozies such as Sarah Shaber's "Simon Shaw" series or Clea Simon's "Dulcie Schwartz" books.

Library Journal

2015-04-28
Murder complicates a college professor's already stressful life. Mahina State University is far from paradise for Molly Barda. The ceiling in her office is crumbling, her office furnishings are limited to a desk, a coffee maker, and a yoga ball, her students are barely literate, and her dean, Bill Vogel, thinks the appropriate punishment for plagiarists is an opportunity to rewrite the offending paper. As a member of the Department of Management in the College of Commerce, Molly is forced to mingle with "our Friends in the Business Community" at events like the breakfast honoring Jimmy Tanaka, "The Most Hated Man in Hawaii." The owner of Merrie Musubis, a fast-food chain whose signature dish is Spam sushi, Tanaka uses his fortune to do things like raze the historic Hanohano Hotel and build a concrete monstrosity in its place. Tanaka's breakfast does have its upside. Molly gets to sit with handsome Donnie Gonsalves, owner of Donnie's Drive-Inns and Tanaka's chief rival for Mahina's fast-food dollar. But the meal is marred by two unfortunate events: Tanaka's absence and the presence of a plastic skull theatrically perched atop a fruit tray. The second causes heartburn for Molly's ex, Stephen Park, a theater professor whose notoriously disorderly prop room is eyed as the source of the prank skull. Molly's colleagues Pat Flanagan and Emma Nakamura repair with her to her office—which does, after all, boast a coffee maker—to mull Tanaka's disappearance. But when the police discover that the prank skull isn't a plastic prop after all, the Student Retention Office's rules for consumer-friendly faculty behavior are suddenly the least of Molly's worries. Molly's debut is a smart and welcome addition to the teaching-college-is-murder genre.

Kirkus Reviews