Avon (Paperback), ISBN 0380803569 ,
I love cozies. Particularly Barbara Jaye Wilson's brand, where the writer thrusts the completely inept and unwilling into danger, intrigue, or just plain insanity, all for the enjoyment of we, the greedy readers. Meet Wilson's lucky victim, Greenwich Village milliner Brenda Midnight, whose fashionable forays into murder and mystery usually cause me to tip my chapeaux. But Brenda's latest venture into the deep underbelly of New York society offers little to raise my hat or my spirits.

Hatful of Homicide, the fifth in the Brenda Midnight Mysteries, started out with a clear advantage. I loved the others in the series, why not this one? And the premise held such infinite possibility. Brenda mistakes her quirky friend Dweena's kidnapping for an inventive ruse to get her to a surprise birthday party. When Brenda gets there, however, a bigger surprise awaits. Not only did no one remember Brenda's birthday (except maybe on again, off again TV personality paramour Johnny Verlane), but someone really kidnapped poor Dweena! And this someone turns out to be a diplomat who caught Dweena trying to relocate his illegally parked vehicle.

After Dweena returns, unharmed but out fifty grand, Brenda mistakenly thinks she can breathe easy and get back to conquering her recent hat-block. But when the counterfeit diplomat turns up implicated in the murder of a regular from Angie's, Brenda's favorite nightspot, Brenda must sideline her creative constipation and questions about her relationship with Johnny. Suddenly, she and Dweena must discover just who killed Ria Kleep, as well as try to save Angie's from becoming the newest Greenwich Village parking lot.

The story held me until the last few chapters. Everywhere Brenda looked lay a potential murderer. And enough red herrings sprang up among friends and neighbors and the victim herself to keep me wondering if Brenda could really trust anybody, from the owner of her favorite restaurant to the guy who owns the local hardware store. But the ending seemed anticlimactic. To borrow from a cliché, it ended not with a bang but with a whimper.

Given the cast of characters and their comedic turns, Hatful promised another success for its author. First you have Dweena, nee Edward, a drag queen with a penchant for stealing -- ahem -- relocating diplomatic vehicles and saving old buildings from destruction with the semi-legit Save Our Brothels campaign (yes, that's SOB). Add one lawyer who spends more time playing agent to his multi-talented pet snake than in the courtroom; a lecherous hardware store owner more interested in, well, stirring Brenda's paint then selling her any and a pseudo-diplomat from the land of Gintoflakokia; and how could you fail?

But fail Hatful did. Somewhere in all the twists and turns and secondary plots, the mystery loses some of its pow. Maybe trying to tie all of these details into the murder of one barfly exceeded the potential of a single, cozy mystery. Not every hat can be a designer showpiece, though. Hopefully for Brenda Midnight fans, the next thrilling adventure will hold something truly worth tipping our hats to.

Diana L. Marsh

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