Veiled Threats (Carnegie Kincaid, Book 1)
Reminiscent of Donna Andrews's Murder, with Peacocks, this zany mystery is a bubbly blend of farcical humor, romance and intrigue. Seattle-based wedding planner Carnegie Kincaid (named after robber baron Andrew Carnegie) has just landed the job that could propel her small business, Made in Heaven Wedding Designs, into the limelight. Nickie Parry's marriage to concert pianist Ray Ishigura promises to be the season's biggest high society wedding, and with Nickie's deep-pocketed, doting father footing the bill, it will likely put Carnegie on Easy Street and get her aging business partner and accountant, Eddie, off her back about their finances. But when someone dies in a suspicious car crash and the bride is kidnapped, the impending nuptials turn from a dream into a nightmare. Relying upon her sharp intuition and active imagination, Carnegie attempts to root out the culprit, and she finds an unlikely ally in Aaron Gold, the short, aggressive reporter who's been hounding the Parry family for weeks. First-time author Donnelly will beguile readers with her keen wit and mint descriptions (the white wedding gown is "a symbol of purity, like the safety seal on an aspirin bottle"), but it is her characters such as Boris the Mad Russian Florist, who is "265 pounds of Slavic fury" that make this a stellar debut.Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.