The Lady Who Cried Murder

By: Lauren Carr

Narrated by: Mike Alger

Length: 7 hrs and 24 mins

Publisher's Summary

Fame comes at a price. Some pay with their privacy. Others pay with their pride. Khloe Everest paid with her life.

Determined to get her pretty face in front of the cameras, Khloe Everest fakes an abduction only to make a grand entrance in the midst of a press conference held by Spencer's Police Chief David O'Callaghan.

Three years later, after failing to catapult her notoriety into a long-lasting celebrity, Khloe Everest returns to Spencer upon her mother's sudden death and seemingly finds another weapon to propel herself into the spotlight. Unfortunately, someone kills her before she can make this entrance.

In Lauren Carr's sixth Mac Faraday Mystery, Mac and his friends come up against reality stars, politicians, has-beens, and wannabes. Mac also finds himself face-to-face with an old foe from his past who had managed to escape arrest during their last encounter. Now, Mac sees that his adversary has only become more powerful, and dangerous, with the passage of time.

Intent to not let this killer escape again, Mac and his friends need to put all of their talents together to put a stop to a cold-blooded lady killer.

©2013 Terri Lynn Zaleski (P)2017 Terri Lynn Zaleski

Glory hound ends up the dead center of attention

Note: Even though this is Book 6 in the series, it works just fine as a stand alone.

Three years ago in Spencer, Maryland, young Khloe Everest was reported missing by her mom after she received a disturbing phone call. However, it turned out to be a publicity stunt and all of the the Spencer police felt a fool when Khloe strolled up during a press conference on the ongoing search for the young lady. Now, she’s planning another publicity stunt in order to relaunch her grab for fame and fortune. This time, things don’t go as she likes and she ends up dead. So many suspects, so little time.

David O’Callaghan, the Spencer Police Chief, isn’t too excited to be called in to check out Khloe’s current residence. The wannabe diva’s social media went dark 3 days ago but David still remembers the sting of her first publicity stunt. Grudgingly, he offers to check it out provided all cameras stay outside. What he finds is quite grisly and the murder investigation is launched.

This book was pretty good though not my favorite in the series. The investigation into Khloe’s murder along with David’s courtship of an old flame, Chelsea, are the two things that stood out to me. There’s also a politician (along with his son) that has some old beef with Mac Faraday (retired DC police detective). That mostly faded into the background for me.

Here is my one criticism for this book. There are some characters that are gay or cross dress and all the characters who do so are on the bad guy list. I can’t tell if the main characters believe that homosexuality or cross dressing are signs of deeper problems and nefarious behavior or not. I’m on the fence on this because I haven’t come across other gay characters before in this series (to my memory). At any rate, I would have preferred that the characters make it clear that there are bad guys that just happen to be gay and not that homosexuality is a trait of questionable behavior.

Back to Khloe. She did have a big bombshell of a secret that she was teasing her followers with, promising to announce it to the world on a specific date. Initially, David isn’t too sure she had any real secret but he has to investigate nonetheless. It was a big secret indeed! I was surprised by this twist and it added a note of seriousness to story. Someone is a real jerk and needs to be taken down!

Then there’s Chelsea. She’s got epilepsy so she has a service dog, Molly, who can sense her episodes coming on and warn her early. Chelsea and David had a relationship in high school and David messed up big time. Back then, he cheated on her and he has regretted that ever since. Now he has a second shot with her and he’s doing his best to prove his sincerity. However, Chelsea is afraid of putting her heart out there again and being hurt. It’s a touch/don’t touch relationship between the two throughout the book. For me, it didn’t have nearly as much appeal as Randi from Book 4. Poor David, I’m not sure he will ever meet the right woman.

Anyway, David and Mac pull strings and dig in the past, calling in Cameron (who we know from the Lovers in Crime series) with her case files that relate to this one. She brought her cat Irving who is a big coon cat that resembles a skunk in coloring. Irving makes me laugh. No one likes being screamed at all the time. Meanwhile, Gnarly dog and Molly make a very cute couple.

All told, it was good. I enjoyed the central mystery around Khloe the most. It was good to have the pets around for comedic relief.

I received a free copy of this book via iRead Book Tours.

The Narration: Mike Algers did a very good job with this book. His female voices were believable and his characters were all distinct. He was great at sounding like a real jerk when giving voice to the foul-mouthed bad guys.

Another Wonderful Lauren Carr Mystery

What made the experience of listening to The Lady Who Cried Murder the most enjoyable?

I enjoyed the character dialogue and the pace of the story.

Did the plot keep you on the edge of your seat? How?

This story was a little more predictable than some of the other books I have enjoyed from this author--but, there were still enough twists and turns and action to keep me interested in the story.

Which character – as performed by Mike Alger – was your favorite?

I think Mac was my favorite character as this narrator gave him the voice I had imagined.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

I never listen to an audiobook in one sitting--and I wasn't drawn to listen to this book beyond my usual listening times each day.

Another great addition to Mac Faraday Mystery

Where does The Lady Who Cried Murder rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

The Lady Who Cried Murder would have to be one of my favorite audio books right up there with all of the others that I have read or listened to in the Mac Faraday Mystery Series. I have yet to find a badly written or uninteresting book that I have read or listened to by Lauren Carr.

Did the plot keep you on the edge of your seat? How?

The Lady Who Cried Murder has one of those plots that pulled me in right from the first chapter. The beginning had the typical amount of setup, but when the murders happened it began a plot that kept me on the edge of my seat with my earbuds pressed tightly into my ears. I was so enthralled that I actually had The Lady Who Cried Murder playing on my Amazon Echo throughout the day so that I could go do things around my house without leaving the book!

Which scene was your favorite?

It would be very hard to pick out one scene in The Lady Who Cried Murder as my favorite, but if I had to it would be the scene at the end where all the puzzle pieces come together for both the characters and the readers/listener.

If you were to make a film of this book, what would the tag line be?

I personally believe that any of the books in the Mac Faraday Mystery Series would make for a great movie. If I had to pick a tagline it would something like Don't Fear Ladies Gnarly is Here.

EXCELLENT. WELL WRITTEN AND PERFORMED

Most enjoyable. I like the team work of Mac and his friends and their pets. Lots of action. Gnarly also plays an important to catch the crooks.
I hope Audible will quickly publish the missing books so that I can download the books in sequence.