Mary Peiffer

"Every investigation has a nature of its own, but there are certain shared characteristics," explains private eye Kinsey Millhone in her 13th alphabetic outing. "Here's what you hope for: a chance remark from the former neighbor on a skip-trace, a penciled notation on the corner of a document, an ex-spouse with a grudge, the number on an account, an item overlooked at the scene of a crime. Here's what you expect: the dead ends, bureaucratic bullheadedness,...

It started with the murder of Kinsey Millhone's sometime drinking buddy, an insurance claims adjuster. But before long Kinsey stumbles onto a massive insurance scam. Going undercover as a wisecracking vamp, Millhone descends into the Los Angeles nether world of machismo and gang hideouts. Her companion, terrified at having crossed the violent crook Raymond Maldonado, is Bibianna Diaz--no Girl Scout herself.

When Morley Shine, a fellow PI, dies from a heart attack, Kinsey Millhone takes over the seemingly simple task of gathering evidence for Lonnie Kingman, a local attorney immersed in a civil suit. Stakes are high. David Birney, acquitted of his wealthy wife's murder five years ago, got his hands on her fortune. Now Kingman wants to divest Birney of the money in favor of the wife's child by an earlier marriage. But the statute of limitations has about...

Kinsey meets him in the local gym. Bobby Callahan is a scarred young man struggling back to life after a car forced his Porsche over the edge of a canyon, battering his body and muddling his memory. All he remembers is that someone, for some reason, tried to kill him. Desperate for clues about his own past life and certain he is being stalked, he asks Kinsey to protect him. Kinsey can't resist the brave kid -- and neither can the killers. Three days...

California private eye Kinsey Millhone takes on a case where nothing seems to add up-one apartment burgled of worthless papers, another mindlessly ransacked and destroyed, a house destroyed by arson and a woman brutally slain.

A Kinsey Millhone mystery. Bailey Fowler, a confessed murderer, escaped from prison 16 years ago. Now, by sheer chance, the cops stumble on him - and a case long dead comes murderously back to life. Royce Fowler, old and sick, reads it "miraculously back to life." His son's reappearance gives Royce a last chance to heal an old wound. And Kinsey Millhone gets to help ... though it nearly costs Kinsey her life!

It was the silly season and a Monday at that, and Kinsey Millhone was bogged down in a preliminary report on a fire claim. Something was nagging at her, but she couldn't pin it. The last thing she needed in the morning mail was a letter from her bank recording an erroneous $5,000 deposit in her account. Kinsey had never believed in Santa Claus and she wasn't about to change her mind now. Resigning herself to a morning of frustration, she phoned the...

The divorced ex-cop, Kinsey Millhone, turns 33, is hired to bring a mother back from the desert, and makes a top slot on Tyrone Patty's hit list, all on the same day.