num_pages: 202
description: Maggie McLendon should be at home in Houston, studying for herPh.D. qualifying exams, but a letter from her great aunt arrives, bearingbad news. Maggie's grandfather, Henry McLendon, whom she has never met, isseriously ill in Jackson, Mississippi. Maggie's father, English professor Gerard McLendon, has been estranged fromhis family since Maggie was an infant, but now there is perhaps one lastchance for the McLendons to be reunited. The family welcomes Maggie andGerard to Jackson, and Gerard has a chance to reconcile with his father. But a murderer strikes, savagely, and Gerard McLendon looks like the chiefsuspect. Maggie must sort out decades of family secrets, including thepuzzle of her grandmother's death twenty-five years before and itsrelationship to the present crime, to arrive at the truth. But not beforethe killer strikes a second time. Could Maggie or her father be next on thelist? About The Author:I've been a devoted mystery reader since the age of tenand now the manager of Murder By The Book, a specialty bookstore in Houston,I have published numerous articles, interviews, and reviews, and severalworks of non-fiction on the subject of mysteries. My first novel-length mystery fiction, Cruel As The Grave, will be publishedin May 2000, by Silver Dagger Mysteries.  I grew up in Mississippi, with scads of cousins all over the place, none ofwhom has ever married one another as far as I know. Sitting around onporches on hot summer days, listening to adults telling stories, I decided Iwanted to tell stories, too. I wrote my first novel when I was twelve, and I've been making up storiesever since. No matter where those stories are set, something Southern creepsin. I think that growing up Southern was like living in the middle of everyone of Shakespeare's plays all at once. Comedy, drama, tragedy,farce--they're with you every day; all you have to do is choose. 
language: English
title: Cruel as the Grave
titlecomplete: Cruel as the Grave (Deep South Mystery, #1)
genres: Mystery, Cozy Mystery
ratings_count: 64
series: Deep South Mystery
publisher: Silver Dagger Mystery