Jane Haddam (1951–2019)

Sweet, Savage Death takes place in the world of category romance, starting with four pages of general editorial guidelines for writing for the fictitious 'Fires of Love' romance line. Nuggets of information and advice about that genre are sprinkled through the humor and murders like chopped nuts through the treat of your choice. I've quoted a couple of them.

Patience 'Pay' Campbell McKenna writes serious articles for serious magazines under her own name, but they're not enough to pay the rent show more on her New York City studio apartment. For that she writes catagory romances under two pen names. She's deathly afraid that those magazine editors might find out and refuse to let her write for them anymore.

It's 15 days until Christmas. Pay longs to be in Connecticut with her family. Instead, she's attending the funeral of the Queen of Category Romance writers. Myrra had been good to her. Myrra had also been eccentric, as the chapter one description of what decorations she wanted for her funeral will attest.
Myrra's death has been written off as a mugging, but if we readers don't know better from the start,
we will by the time Pay finds the next body. There will be more...

Pay McKenna doesn't take care of herself. She's six feet tall (182.88 cm). Even if she has a small frame, the minimum desirable weight for her height would be 138 pounds (62.595 kg). Pay weighs 125 (56.699) and has been fasting for 3 days because she couldn't fit into a size seven bathing suit. At least that explains why Pay isn't exactly alert when she finds that first body.

Someone is murdering people in the romance field and Pay is being framed for the jobs. She gets good advice from Nick Carras, a very tall and handsome lawyer friend of Pay's best friend, Phoebe. (Pay's lawyer boyfriend is worse than useless.) Pay insists on investigating on her own anyway.

Fellow animal lovers who share my horror when pets are killed in mysteries may read this one. There is a description of a distressing incident in Pay's past in chapter, but the present-day dog and kitten will be fine. They'll be fine despite the fact that the author lets characters feed them chocolate, a definite advantage to being fictional pets.

Chapter 12 starts with members of the Line Committee discussing nominees. I've quoted the opening. It gets worse for the members, so it's more fun for us. Chapter 15 gives us backstory for another rich category romance writer. It's no wonder Amelia Samson is so tough. Chapter 17 gives us the backstory of yet another writer, Lydia Wentworth. So that's why her agent made her wear her hair long no matter what was fashionable. Much of the time Pay makes me want to tear at my hair, but I loved her favorite dream in chapter 26. The Grand Ball for the romance writers convention starts in chapter 27. There Pay has best friend and kitten trouble at the same time. The description of the Queen of Hearts crown had me laughing loudly.

Speaking of the kitten, I loved her scenes, especially the way she proved Pay right about something to the homicide detective.

You don't have to be a romance fan to enjoy this book. It's not in the same style as the author's Gregor Demarkian series (written under the pen name 'Jane Haddam'). I love comedic mysteries, so I prefer McKenna. show less

#17 in the Gregor Demarkian series.

Religion is inescapable in the Demarkian series, if only because Gregor’s closest friend is Father Tibor Kasparian, pastor of Holy Trinity Armenian Christian Church. Quite a few books feature an order of Roman Catholic nuns, the Sisters of Divine Grace; they are some of the best in the series. In Baptism in Blood, Haddam takes a fairly positive look at Southern fundamentalist Christian in a small town; there is a lesbian community that more or less show more abrades the sensitivities of the fundamentalists, but there is no actual hostile action.

True Believers presents an extreme of fundamentalist Christianity, those who actively hate homosexuals. I use the word “hate” deliberately. It’s on thing to disagree with someone’s belief system; it is quite another to disagree violently. Rather than in a small southern town, the confrontation between an Episcopal congregation, St. Stephen’s, of gay men and a group of fundamentalists whose pastor actively pursues and harasses the gay congregation takes place in Philadelphia. In a delightful coincidence, St. Stephen’s is located directly across the street from St. Anselm’s, whose parochial schools is run by none other than—you guessed it—the Sisters of Divine Grace; Sister Mary Scholastica, whom fans of the series have met before, is the principal. Also making an appearance is the Cardinal Archbishop of Philadelphia who looks as if he’s modeled at least partly on the real life Archbishop of Boston, Sean Cardinal O’Malley: both are Franciscans, both were sent in to clean up the mess due to the pedophilia scandal, both are ascetics. Haddam portrays the fictional Archbishop in a very intriguing way—generally and heartily disliked by officaldom (including Demarkian), but in private, very introspective and far more “human” and compassionate than his public face would suggest. Haddam lives in Connecticut. It’s always tempting to speculate…..

Anyway, back to the book itself. As always, the Sisters of Divine Grace lend a very special air to any Demarkian book, particularly since members of the order have a distressing habit of being murdered! No exception here, although we have a very catholic (sorry) spectrum of victims.

One of the best parts of this book is the portrayal of the fundamentalist congregation and its obsessed pastor, Ray Phipps. It is neither pleasant nor in any way complimentary. The group is portrayed as people who have little education, not terribly intelligent, easily led, and prone to violence. Phipps plays on all of those characteristics while holding them—and the people--in contempt. In one section of the book, he basically incites a riot, and makes certain that he is in no way implicated.

One of the most outstanding segments involves a hilarious confrontation between the Cardinal Archbishop and the pastor of St. Stephens with Phipps. It’s worth the price of the book.

Haddam’s Demarkian series started out strong and then for a few novels was just mostly ok—still worth reading but not up to the quality of her earlier books. With this book and Skeleton Key, she comes roaring back with the same old formula she’s always used in her book structures, but fine writing and good plotting. Her husband died of cancer not that long ago, and it is easy to imagine that the situation impacted her writing. But she’s back stronger than ever, more power to her, and all her fans have to be delighted. show less

Murder Superior by Jane Haddam was initially published back in 1993, the eighth title in her Gregor Demarkian mystery series. The marketing hook used in that series (at least initially) was that each case was tied to an American holiday – Christmas, Easter, St. Patrck’s Day, Fourth of July, etc. In the instance of Murder Superior, the holiday used was Mother’s Day. Haddam established a close-knit community surrounding Gregor in a neighborhood in Philadelphia. Among the returning show more characters here are Bennis Hannaford (his girlfriend) and Father Tibor, his close friend who spends way more time on the Internet of the nineties than might be advisable. By this point in the series, Demarkian’s professional activities have landed him in the public spotlight – both on broadcast news as well as People magazine. He hates it.

In this instance, it’s Mothers Day. Demarkian is invited to give a talk and ends up being dragged into a murder on the grounds of a Catholic college located in Radnor, Pennsylvania. The Order of the Sisters of the Divine Grace are holding their annual gathering with nuns flying in from all parts of the world. Nuns, being possessed of the same human nature as the rest of us, have disagreements that can flare up but Sister Joan Esther is really quite likeable. Was she the intended victim of murder or was someone else? What sort of chicanery is going on?

The only problem I have with Jane Haddam’s work is that sometimes she tends to tell rather than show. The introduction of characters as potential characters is generally complex and frequently drawn-out. But the books in this series have a good deal of humor to them and to read about Demarkian's caring community offers a sense of positivity. show less

Gregor is called to a small town in NY to consult on a murder of a young man who disappeared 12 years before. His body has been found hanging off a billboard and it's clear to Gregor that the body had been moved after death. The local police are incompetents bragging up the lack of crime in their small town and spending stimulus money on GPS's and blue tooth instead of a coroner. Gregor has to call in the state police forensics for help much to the chagrin of the locals. Once the old owner show more of a construction company seeks Gregor out about the skeleton of a baby found in a backpack at his site, the case takes a whole new turn. show less