Publisher's Synopsis
As Ann Kern starts her new business as an interior decorator, the temperatures have risen, tulips and daffodils are in bloom and there's a feeling of endless possibilities in the air. She has no idea that her world is about to be turned upside down.
When Janis Riley, a woman for whom money is no object, contacts Ann to redecorate her house, she is elated. But the initial visit with her first client leaves her with mixed emotions. Why did Janis react so strangely to seeing a photo of Davey, Ann's six-year-old son?
But Ann has bigger problems. Her husband, David, a recovering alcoholic, has lost both his mother and his job and Ann worries that he'll start drinking again. To add to her concerns, their next-door-neighbor, Dorothy Baker, is severely depressed but Ann's efforts to help her are rebuffed.
Ann is terrified when she wakes up the day before Easter to find Davey gone. Another child, Kelly Kramer, has been missing since December. Where are the children? And what, if anything, can Ann do to get her son back?
PRAISE FOR THE MALONE MYSTERY SERIES
"Fans of Mary Higgins Clark will greet [Mixed Messages] with enthusiasm. Like Clark in her early classic mystery/suspense novel A Stranger Is Watching, Gligor creates a frightening world for a sympathetic protagonist. Ann Kern, loving wife and mother, is surrounded by threats. Her husband, an alcoholic and a gambler, is emotionally unstable. There is also a serial killer on the prowl on the west side of Cincinnati and it appears that Ann is intended to be his next victim. There are a number of possible suspects. Author Gligor thoroughly develops each character in the novel, going into back stories, thoughts, behavior and actions. But this does not slow the plot which develops at a fast pace. Definitely a novel the reader will not put down until the final words are read."
- Jacqueline Seewald, author of Death Legacy
"As a "cozy" mystery writer--and reader--I tend to shy away from suspense/terror. You might say I've become sissified over the years. However . . . I do make exceptions, and Unfinished Business is one of those. While many suspense authors indulge in a shock fest of over the top violence, Gligor takes the time to build the suspense, psychological rather than gut-wrenching. Like a classic Hitchcock film, the fear-turned-to terror mounts. All the while we empathize with the main character's plight. In the midst of this cozily familiar holiday, something is very wrong. Despite my trepidation, I braved on, reading to the end because I had to know what happened to Ann. Although I kept the lights on that night, it was worth it!"
- Sharon L. Cook, author of A Nose for Hanky Panky
Other books in the MALONE MYSTERY SERIES
- MIXED MESSAGES
- UNFINISHED BUSINESS
