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Product Description
Praise the Ancestors! After three years of housekeeping for Boston's haughty elite, Blanche White is finally coming home to North Carolina for an entire summer. And like a sign from above that she's headed in the right direction, Blanche has already lined up a date with the handsome train conductor she met somewhere between Boston and Baltimore. The summer holds lots of promise, including helping her best friend, Ardell, with her new catering business. Then, on her first night back, Blanche runs into David Palmer, the man who raped her eight years ago. The time has now come for Blanche to exact her revenge. So when a young girl is murdered and it looks as if Palmer may be involved, Blanche pursues every possible lead to help put an end to his legacy once and for all.
Amazon.com Review
Blanche White, Barbara Neely's smart, queen-sized, middle-aged African American sleuth, is a no-nonsense dame who's carrying some old baggage when she takes the summer off from cleaning houses for rich Boston matrons and returns to her North Carolina hometown. Almost a decade ago, Blanche was raped by David Palmer, scion of the town's leading family. Although she never brought charges against him, Blanche hasn't forgiven or forgotten. Now Palmer's sister is engaged to a sweet, mildly retarded young man for whom Blanche has a deep affection. When asked by his guardian to investigate the girl by using her connections with the domestics who know everything about the private lives of the town's most prominent families, Blanche sees an opportunity to bring the man who raped her to justice. The fact that he's been implicated in the murder of another woman makes revenge an even sweeter prospect.
What's most interesting about this lively series is the point of view of its heroine, a woman with a strong and clearly depicted perspective on the uneasy truce between blacks and whites in American society. Neely has created a true original in Blanche. With every new outing in this snappy series(Blanche Cleans Up, Blanche Among the Talented Tenth, Blanche on the Lam), she peels back more layers to reveal her heroine's emotional depths, her hard-earned wisdom, and her difficult but ultimately rewarding connection with the people she loves. Add love, hate, race, and homicide to Neely's expert characterizations, and you get a great read from a terrific, award-winning writer. --Jane Adams
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