Killer Smile

Killer Smile

Adult mystery
I can't get enough of spine chilling tales. Whenever I pick up
one of Lisa Scottoline's mysteries I know I have a winner. Killer
Smile definitely lived up to my high expectations. It also answered a
history question I've mulled on for decades.
"It was a nightmare. Everything had been swept off her desk:
phone, legal pads, dictaphone, pencils, papers, and a Swingline
stapler lay all over the floor. Her desk drawers had been yanked
open, turned upside down on the carpet, their contents dumped..."
One night lawyer Mary Dinunzio finds her office trashed. A key
file for a case she's working on is missing. The offices of the other
lawyers in her firm haven't been touched...
...which seems really strange because the case Mary is
investigating is ice cold. Amadeo Brandolini had been an Italiam
immigrant when Pearl Harbor thrust America into World War II. He'd
been interned in an enemy alien camp in which he'd committed suicide
after learning of the death of his beloved wife. Mary is working for
his son's estate, trying to sue for reparations. She's been studying
boxes of documents and hardly finding a thing. Friends, family
members, and colleagues are urging her to cut her losses and get off
the case.
Only there's the break in and file theft. Traveling to Montana
to learn more about the internment camp, Mary finds evidence that
Brandolini's death might have been homicide. She returns to
Philadelphia to find that a lawyer working with her on the case has
been shot. And there's the black Escalade that seems to be following
her around.
In other words there are some very bad people who will stop at
nothing to keep Mary from discovering over half century old information.
Decades ago I'd learned about the Japanese internment camps.
I'd wondered why we hadn't imprisoned Italian and German immigrants
since we were also at war with their countries. Today I learned that
600,000 Italian immigrants (including Scottoline's grandparents) had
to register as enemy aliens and over 10,000 were sent to internment
camps. There is even a list of books for if I want to learn more. Yes!
On a purrrsonal note, the past few days I have been immersed in a
task. You see I was really frustrated that none of the Black Lives
Matter protests are within walking distance. And I don't have money to
donate to causes People of Color favor. So I wondered what use I am.
Then I learned that a lot more White-like-me people want to read race/
racism related literature than in the past. Only they don't know
where to find it. Louis Pasteur said that chance favors the
prepared. Well creating an annotated bibliography was something I was
very prepared to do. I went over my nine years of reviews and made up
an index card for each relevant book. I ended up with 260. Now I
have to put the document on my iPod and start finding the people to
whom to send it. (Jules)
The children have been visiting me. They like to look in the window
and talk to me. I don't blame them. I am a very pretty cat. (Tobago)
A great big shout out goes out to the readers who want to learn more
about race and racism.
Tobago and Jules Hathaway


Sent from my iPod