EricCWelch

Hmmmm.  How to describe the first chapter of this book.  Rachel has moved to St. Louis where she has started a new firm.  Her first client is, well, how shall we put this.  The case involves a will, an irate wife, fellatio, Big Macs with special sauce, Golden Showers, Visa statements, and the threat of photographs. It’s also very funny.

Although she has sworn never to take another divorce case, Rachel is persuaded by Anne, her sister, to help Eileen Landau. As she soon learns, Eileen is having an affair with Andros, a local fitness instructor, otherwise spelled g.i.g.o.l.o. When Andros turns up dead in a hotel room where he and Eileen were having a tryst and Eileen admits she skipped after watching him in the throes of being poisoned, Rachel knows she has a problem, especially since Eileen took along Andros’s briefcase that contained some rather explicit pictures of the two of them.  But it turns out that Rachel’s sister is also in a photo album kept by the dead man and she is charged with his murder.

Rachel’s investigation begins to turn up all sorts of complications.  Good mystery.  Light on the legal side.   Benny continues to amuse and delight.  To wit:  (pun intended)

<i>“Probably because normal people believe that a bowel movement is a private act,” I said.

Benny clicked off the flashlight and closed his book.

“And sex isn’t?”

“Yeah, but sex sells books.”

“I’m not just talking hot-sex junk fiction,” he said.

“I’m talking front page of the New York Times Book Review fiction. I’m talking Saul Bellow, Philip Roth, John Updike, Alice Hoffman. You’ve got people shtupping like crazy in those books. Blow jobs, hand jobs, rim jobs—you name it.”

I shrugged. “Maybe the authors think that a sexual encounter is a way to reveal something about a character’s personality.”

He gave me an astounded look. “And taking a dump isn’t?”</i>

I'm reading the entire series.