DEADLY AS NATURE Envy Spawns Grief

It is 1970, the year Janis Joplin dies. Drugs and alcohol define the lives of more than a few folks living in eastern Wisconsin. Others wave banners protesting the unpopular war in Vietnam. After all, what is it good for? People would rather make love.

Treacherous waves on Lake Michigan toss Insurance Investigator Pepper Bibeau into the company of an intriguing and self-reliant blind lady. Haunted by past events, the lady presents Pepper with an unusual request to help clear up a murder. To link these events to an investigation on her cousin’s life insurance claim, Pepper delves into a family history she didn’t know existed.

More curious than suspicious over the husband’s cancellation of her cousin’s claim, Pepper digs for a rational explanation. What she unearths are family skeletons best left undisturbed. Then her uncle points out a possible connection between a grandaunt’s death and one of her investigations. Now Pepper must weigh the fate of the living against memories of the dead.

Pepper’s son resides in Hawaii, but his father lives right next door to her, and Homicide Sergeant Rick Janus wants to resume a relationship that faded ten years ago. A week-end fishing trip together could prove interesting, provided no more dead bodies pile up.

Well-intended deeds of ancestors often lead to unwise choices, even for those sworn to uphold the law. Because of her mixed heritage, Pepper has dealt with prejudice during most of her twenty-eight years and always kept her hackles lowered around bigoted people. Until now. A situation left to simmer over time builds to a confrontation that will not allow her to walk away. By the time she figures out what her cousin's missing high-top pink sneaker has to do with a letter written by a fifteen-year-old nun in Paris, the loaded revolver is cocked and aimed at Pepper’s heart.