Killer Cuts

Title: Killer Cuts

Author: Elaine Viets

Publisher: Obsidian Mystery

Copyright Date: 2009

Print Date: May 2009

ISBN: 9780451226860

Pages: 264

Series: 8th of the Dead-End Job Mystery series





Book Description (from dust jacket):

Living life on the lam — and working wherever she can find a paycheck — Helen Hawthorne has a knack for keeping a low profile. Currently she's mixing pay cuts with haircuts, working as a gofer for a famous manager of a chic salon, who's a pasionate believer in do or die....

Hair today...gone tomorrow.

Helen Hawthorne's latest gig is working in Miguel Angel's Fort Lauderdale hair salon, where a trim can cost as much as a car payment and a blowout can wipe you out. But when one of the salon's most famous clients, gossip blogger and cable TV show host Kingman "King" Oden, is murdered at his own wedding, things get a little hairy.

The salon gets tangled up in all kinds of negative publicity when Miguel is named a prime suspect, but he lies low by dressing in drag. Meanwhile, Helen is determined to find the murderer, who also favors spiked heels. When she starts getting threatening notes, it seems more imperative than ever that she figure out who at the wedding was dressed to kill.

Comments:

This is another book I've been wanting to read for some time. Ever since I read Clubbed to Death, in fact. This is one of Helen's better jobs.

UPDATE: I just realized this was posted before I finished writing my thoughts.  So...

This series has a nice supporting cast, but I have to say, Margery irritated me at several points during this book. Helen (while working as a errand-girl at a classy hair salon and solving a murder case) is also planning her own wedding. And Margery insists she invite her estranged mother. Then, after Helen complies, she harps on it more. And, uh, hello. It's not like Helen chose to have a mother who absolutely wouldn't support her in any way. Who wanted Helen to stay with a scumball cheating husband, and now (since she didn't) will do nothing but criticize her. I just wished she would look beyond her ideals, hopes, and presumptions long enough to realize Helen had been hiding (and not confiding) from her mother all this time for a good reason, not because she was being stubborn.