MURDER MANUAL

Womack's fifth Harry Denton novel--nominated for an Edgar Award and winner of the Shamus Award--is wry and entertaining despite the author's employment of clichés. The self-destructive Nashville private eye is set against the cops, a televangelist, and the high-stakes publishing world as he becomes the suspect in the murder of the man he was hired to snoop. While cliché is the very fabric of the PI genre, Womack's use of them is unoriginal and hackneyed. L.J. Ganser's voice is pleasantly acerbic--a good quality for wry whodunits-- but his performance is marred by a nasal quality during the first half of the story. S.E.S. © AudioFile 2001, Portland, Maine [Published: APR/MAY 01]