Going through my iBooks, I stumbled upon this intriguing cover:
Mischief becomes her by Kasey Michaels is the second book in The Sunshine Girls trilogy about 3 sisters who try to solve unsolved cases to clear their father’s name. Their father was a police detective for years, and he became a P.I. and kept on investigating some of his unsolved cases after his retirement. But then he was killed a few weeks ago, and the police called it suicide, an act of remorse after he had supposedly killed a woman just before. The girls refuse to believe this of their father and continue working his unsolved cases to find out why he was murdered and by who.
In the first book, Dial M for Mischief, middle child Jolie Sunshine, a famous actress, has reconnected with her high school sweetheart and they solve the case of the vanishing bride. This time it’s up to baby of the family Jessica, an investigative reporter and TV show host, to solve one of the remaining 3 open cases with the help of police detective Matt. They decide to look into the case of the Fishtown Strangler, where 6 women were raped and strangled over 10 years ago. Since they were prostitutes, it wasn’t investigated very well way back when, and their father had recently begun looking back into it. He found some new clues, which Jessica is determined to chase down, to get closer to clearing her father’s name.
Her first step in doing so, is giving out her sister’s cellphone number on her TV show for people to call when they have any updates on the three remaining open cases (the other two being the murder of Terrell Johnson and the Dumpster Baby). This sets off seasoned detective Matt as he feels their safety is now in danger and they will get nothing out of it, safe for a number of wackos and false leads. He appears to be right, but Jessica maintains that it was the right move, forging ahead despite his reservations.
Jessica is what appears to be the definition of a blonde bombshell, curvy and blonde with a winning smile to boot. But behind that facade, she hides a sharp mind and a sharp-as-tacks brain and a whole lot of guts. But she is also quite emotional and deeply cares about her sisters and clearing her father’s name. That leads to her leaping to conclusions and jumping to action when she should have maybe taken a step back to think about things more and consider repercussions. Which greatly frustrates Matt. He is the more sober thinker, always thinking before he acts and trying to steer the girls towards ways to clear their father’s name that will be legal and hold up in court. They spark against each other quite often, and it eventually leads to them in the bedroom together. But Matt is worried about their age difference (about 11 years) and she is trying to sort out her feelings in the middle of still grieving over her father and throwing herself into work.
The three books are definitely meant to be read together and in order. They refer to each other often, and we really see how the three sisters work together to solve these crimes. Their significant others are also on the scene. I like that the three books make one whole, and that we continue to learn more about the characters that star in the other books. The sisters have an interesting dynamic, which their significant others try to figure into.
So in this book we see Jessica and Matt not only look into the strangler case, but also digging up more clues about the other two, and possibly connecting two of their cases together? They manage to solve the Fishtown Strangler case and stumble upon a major clue for the Dumpster Baby case. They also manage to overcome their differences and give into love.
After finishing this book, I immediately went to Google to figure out where I can get the other two. Because I want to read how Jolie solved the first case and how she reconnected with Sam (because I know the outcome to it from this book, but not the how). And I also really want to see how Jade and Court solve their problems while solving the last two cases and clearing their father’s name!
Have you read any of the Sunshine Girls trilogy? Let me know what you thought!
Happy reading,
Loes M.