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Once again, Linda Palmer takes us behind the scenes in the world of daytime drama (never soap operas). Morgan Tyler has been promoted to head writer and co-executive producer of Love of My Life, and with a cushy apartment in one of New York's most famous buildings, the Dakota (home of John Lennon and Yoko Ono), she would seem to be riding high. The scenario changes, however, when she gets a frantic call summoning her to the apartment of the program's star, Cybelle Carter, who has been murdered. But wait! The victim is not Cybelle Carter, but her body double, Jeannie Ford, hired by Morgan, when Cybelle' fear of water made her refuse to swim. Was Cybelle the intended victim, because the 'weapon' was poisoned chocolate pudding, known to be her favorite snack? Cybelle comes to Morgan, begging her help in avoiding her husband, a man from whom she fled in Europe. She is afraid that he will track her down when she appears with two other divas on the cover of Time. Since she is without the huge ego usually associated with stars, it's a puzzle as to why she agreed to the article. When Morgan finally meets the husband in question, he accuses Cybelle of being "raptor," and of having stolen an extremely valuable coin from him. Morgan, a widow for five years, has a dilemma that might be the wish of many women. She has three men in pursuit of her -- a policeman, who becomes extremely irritated when Morgan hires a private investigator after the police department has dubbed Jeannie's death a cold case; a writer of true crime, who takes a plane from the Netherlands for the day, just to make sure that Morgan is okay; and Cybelle's almost ex-husband, a charming womanizer. Morgan's motive for investigating is rather flimsy, though. It's hard to believe that guilt at hiring Jeannie would be so utterly overwhelming. Palmer, not surprisingly, is a skilful plotter, and she takes characters that could have been cliches (Morgan's browbeaten co-executive producer, the ice queen vice-president) and turns them into well-rounded people. There are annoying hints about Morgan's background which are never resolved. When she hires the private investigator, she asks him to find out if Michael (Cybelle's co-stair) has any secrets but not to tell her if they aren't relevant. The detective finds out that Michael indeed has secrets, but he doesn't reveal them. This is simply cheating the reader. If it's irrelevant, why bring it up at all? For someone who has been threatened with a live rattlesnake and beaten up, Morgan has no reservations about staying alone in an isolated house by herself when the company goes off for location shooting in Hollywood. And, finally, when she is making a frantic search of the murderer's home, she notices every detail of the decor in every room.
Reviewed by Mary Elizabeth Devine, May 2005
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