Murder Is a Family Business

A DETECTIVE AGENCY WITH HEART.
ALSO MOM, KIDS, AND A KITTEN!

It’s a dismal day for the PI firm to the stars of Silicon Valley when their own star is huddled in a phone booth instead of tracking down stolen software. Sadly, ace detective Lee Alvarez is currently taking shelter from a deluge while surveilling some rat of a husband. This is way beneath her dignity!

Worse, she may be trapped with another rat. Something in there just moved.

But Lee’s luck just changed—that’s no drowned rat. It’s her thoroughly drenched, pathetically skinny, and terminally cute new BFF— an orange and white kitten tiny enough to fit in a pocket. Well, forget the surveillance.

When you catch on that this is the kind of mystery that starts with rescuing a kitten, you know you're in good hands!

But Lee can’t forget the surveillance—she’s been assigned to the case by her formidable boss, the elegant Lila Alvarez (aka her mom), who’s doing a favor for an old friend. When she investigates why the rat hasn't left his lair, she discovers the worst,— he has a few fresh holes in his chest.

She soon uncovers a criminal web of international proportions amid dark and harrowing dangers she never signed up for. But is she up to a near-death experience? Well! Is a kitten adorable?

Author Haven quickly rolls out all the warm and fuzzy delights a cozy fan could wish for—in the form of a delightfully eccentric, usually squabbling, yet thoroughly loving detective family, each with his or her special talent, beginning with its matriarch. Lila possesses all the WASPy refinement of Princess Grace, in cool contrast to her spirited half-Latina daughter Lee. (Liana to her mom, and that tells you so much!)

Completing the quartet is the adoring uncle you’ve always wanted (he cooks!), and the genius bro’ who made the firm famous with his brilliant cyber-detection. Trust us, this series has everything but tea and cookies.

Fans of PI stories, cozy mysteries, and women sleuths will go bananas,, especially if they love sharp funny female protagonists like Sue Grafton’s witty Kinsey Millhone and Janet Evanovich’s lovable Stephanie Plum. Aficionados of Lisa Lutz’s family series, The Spellman Files, will get a special kick out of the Alvarez clan.

Readers will also enjoy the fact that this series may be a first. Father/son detective teams abound—think The Republic of Doyle and The Good Cop—but mom/daughter sleuths are an idea whose time has come. Step right up and meet Lee and Lila.


Genre: Cozy Mystery