Cat in a Quicksilver Caper (Midnight Louie Series #18)
Midnight Louie, alley-cat extraordinaire and Las Vegas's hairiest, hard-boiled PI, finds himself literally walking a tightrope when a fabulous museum opening at one of Sin City's swankiest casinos is marred by a little thing like death.\ Louie's loyal roommate, feisty PR freelancer Temple Barr, has snagged the commission of her career: repping the opening exhibition of the Russian Czars' priceless treasures at the New Millennium Hotel, the apex of which is the Czar Alexander Scepter, a...
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The eighteenth title in Douglas's Midnight Louie series, Cat in A Quicksilver Caper is the continuation of the escapades of Midnight Louie and company, both feline and human. The ace pet detective has his hands full keeping his petite red-headed female huPublishers WeeklyMidnight Louie, hard-boiled feline PI, and his human pal, Temple Barr ("Miss Nancy Drew on killer spikes"), whose Vegas PR jobs invariably land her in shark-infested hot water, team up for their 18th cat-astrophically cool crime caper (after 2005's Cat in a Hot Pink Pursuit). Once a flaming natural redhead and now a bottle blonde, Temple is still dithering between two lovers, Mystifying Max Kinsella, a former magician, and Matt Devine, an ex-priest and radio shrink. Her current PR job is helping the New Millennium Hotel prepare for the White Russian art exhibition and aerial magic show featuring the Cloaked Conjuror and a scary Asian diva. A mysterious death before the opening, a fatal "accident" at the opening plus the theft of the exhibition's crown jewel, Czar Alexander's scepter, spell big trouble. Meanwhile, LVPD's Carmen Molina believes she's being stalked by Max, Matt proposes marriage to Temple, and the Synth (a cabal of evil magicians) plots more chicanery leading to a shocking cliffhanger. (July) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.
Chapter One\ Swept Off Her Feet\ Temple Barr woke up at 10:30 a.m. in her own bed, which was hardly unusual, and supposed that there wasn't a woman in America who didn't ache for one of those Scarlett O'Hara moments.\ Maybe it was Scarlett swearing to heaven that she'd never have to choke down another raw turnip (or broccoli or cauliflower floret...or diet book) again.\ Maybe it was the spunky freshman Scarlett, telling that blind-stupid Ashley Wilkes right out that he ought to be dating her instead of some wimpy prom queen from the next plantation down along the Sewanee.\ Maybe it was Scarlett cornered on the stairs of Tara shooting an attacking Yankee soldier dead.\ Or Scarlett in any of the dazzling fashion-show gowns in which she schemed, fought, and flounced her way through the Civil War and its aftermath...especially the gutsy gown made from green velvet drapes she wore to convince a jailed Rhett Butler that she wasn't down and out when she was.\ But the most perfect Scarlett moment of all involved the crimson velvet dressing gown she wore as Rhett carried her upstairs when he'd had it with her fickle, bewitching, bitching Scarlett ways.\ Feminists long removed from the 1930s debut of Margaret Mitchell's Gone with the Wind choked on their turnips over that scene, which to modern sensibilities plays like date rape—-or, in that case, wife rape.\ But no matter how a woman might land on the swept-upstairs-scene issue, she couldn't fault the famous morning-after scene.\ What a wake-up call! That was when Vivien Leigh's Scarlet awoke in a cat-contented camera close-up. When her eyes recalled the-night-before-the-morning-after with the devilish satisfaction of a distinctly un-downtrodden Southern belle indeed....\ Temple awoke this day to one of those classic dawning moments. It made her world take an unexpected lurch toward a totally different axis than it had previously been twirling around like a ballerina in a well-known routine.\ Oh. Right. Yes. Oh. My. Oh. Dear. Oh!\ Because all morning-afters have their down as well as their up sides, and Temple was starting to see that. It didn't help that Midnight Louie, all fully furred twenty pounds of him, was sitting on her chest like a guilty conscience, staring at her with unblinking feline-green eyes.\ His mesmerizing eyes and shiny black hair reminded her that she was betrothed (as much as you could be in a modern world) to raven-haired Max Kinsella, a magician on hiatus. Louie's watchful presence also reminded her that Louie had been on patrol in the apartment early this morning when she'd returned from her supposedly bland dinner date with neighbor Matt Devine, during which certain overly neighborly things had occurred and mention had been made of the M-word: marriage.\ Louie knew. Somehow.\ And that gloriously green stare said that he understood every miserable nuance of her now hopelessly complicated love life. And that he did not approve.\ Neither, she knew, would Max.\ Copyright © 2006 by Carole Nelson Douglas
\ Publishers WeeklyMidnight Louie, hard-boiled feline PI, and his human pal, Temple Barr ("Miss Nancy Drew on killer spikes"), whose Vegas PR jobs invariably land her in shark-infested hot water, team up for their 18th cat-astrophically cool crime caper (after 2005's Cat in a Hot Pink Pursuit). Once a flaming natural redhead and now a bottle blonde, Temple is still dithering between two lovers, Mystifying Max Kinsella, a former magician, and Matt Devine, an ex-priest and radio shrink. Her current PR job is helping the New Millennium Hotel prepare for the White Russian art exhibition and aerial magic show featuring the Cloaked Conjuror and a scary Asian diva. A mysterious death before the opening, a fatal "accident" at the opening plus the theft of the exhibition's crown jewel, Czar Alexander's scepter, spell big trouble. Meanwhile, LVPD's Carmen Molina believes she's being stalked by Max, Matt proposes marriage to Temple, and the Synth (a cabal of evil magicians) plots more chicanery leading to a shocking cliffhanger. (July) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.\ \ \ \ \ Kirkus ReviewsNoir cat Midnight Louie (Cat in a Neon Nightmare, 2003, etc.) is involved in yet another Las Vegas-based caper. PR freelancer Temple Barr is handling publicity for an exhibition of precious Russian artifacts crowned by the jeweled scepter of Czar Alexander. With typical Vegas overkill, the exhibit at the New Millennium Hotel also features the Cloaked Conjuror, his black leopards, his assistant Shangri-La and Hyacinth, her vicious cat. When a body is found hanging over the exhibit, Temple manages to spin the death as an accident, even though White Russians, Red Russians and Chechens are all rumored to be involved. Meantime, Temple balances her private life between her longtime love for master magician/secret agent Max Kinsella and her new romance with ex-priest Matt Devine. When the scepter is stolen in a daring high-wire raid, a masked intruder (Max?) rescues the Cloaked Conjuror from a fatal plunge but fails to save Shangri-La when her cat attacks him. Behind the scenes, Louie, his daughter Miss Midnight Louise and other felines slink around the New Millennium sniffing out clues. Max is so intent on infiltrating the Synth, a group of renegade magicians, that he has little time for Temple, but she manages to solve the case, if not her personal problems. Devoted fans of this long-running series won't mind that this installment is less interested in mystery than in showcasing some really cute cats.\ \
