Major Lennox, just a few days away from his wedding, is visiting his friend, ex-Inspector Swift. There is a phone call from Montague Morgan, claiming he is in trouble down on the London docks. There is a gunshot, a 'thud', nothing further. Seems straight forward enough, Swift calls Scotland Yard to investigate. Only the next day the operator who put the call through came around to tell him that the call did NOT originate from that location. (So, tracking someone by a phone is not new)! And so the mystery starts. Why lie about his location, and was Morgan even truly dead (no body, at least not his, as yet). There's the missing money, too. Oh, and boot leggers, from the US (think Prohibition). The Mystery of Montague Morgan is another of the mysteries featuring Heathcliffe ( but don't call him that) Lennox by Karen Baugh Menuhin. (Be sure to pay attention to the words in the Christmas carols sung by his butler).

I love the old Broadway musicals, so was curious when I found The Sound of Murder, the first in the Musical Murder series by K.L. Montgomery. It involves a traveling theatre troupe, getting ready to put on The Sound of Music in a small southern town. All seems to be going well until Ruby finds the body of the actor playing the Mother Abbess in the creek of a park where she is taking her morning jog. She and her new friend Nova decide to investigate, (they don't think the local police are doing enough) and that takes them into an interesting trail of bike gangs, and a Will, a big insurance payoff and more. Not a bad little mystery!

Reading Hermit With Dog