This book is the second in a series of mystery novels written by Sue Grafton.
Kinsley Millhone is a single young woman who runs a private detective agency. Business is often quite slow for her and she has to pay her own bills, although she doesn’t always like the cases she has taken on to investigate.
In “B is for Burglar”, Kinsley is approached by a wealthy woman named Beverly Danziger who wants Kinsley to find her sister, Elaine Boldt. Ms. Danzier claims that she is motivated by the fact that she needs her sister’s signature on some documents to claim a small inheritance.
Kinsley begins her search by talking to Mrs. Boldt’s neighbors. She learns that the last time he saw Mrs. Boldt was her on her way to the airport. It was believed that she was traveling to Boca Raton when she left.
So Kinsley decides to travel to Boca Raton but is unable to find Mrs. Boldt once she gets there. The number of questions Kinsley has grows, while the number and types of responses he gets are bewildering.
As the search continues, Kinsley discovers that one of Mrs. Boldt’s former bridgemates had been murdered prior to Mrs. Boldt’s disappearance and she begins to wonder if there was a connection between the murder and the disappearance.
When one of Mrs. Boldt’s neighbors have their home vandalized and another neighbor is found murdered, there are even more questions on Kinsley’s mind.
Kinsley grows increasingly uncomfortable with the situation and the fact that things continue to get worse for people who knew or were associated with Ms. Boldt. However, she is determined to solve the mystery and her commitment to it leads her into situations where her own life is in danger.
The author, Sue Grafton, has written this book as part of a series. Her plot has many twists and turns that the reader couldn’t predict and this makes the whole plot interesting. The characters are represented in an easily understandable way. In fact, they are presented in a way that makes them seem like people each of us might meet in our personal lives. There are also, of course, people who are motivated to do evil and who will stop at nothing to satisfy their own selfish needs. And their actions are what turn everyday life into a situation that includes murder and deceit.
This is only the second book I have read in the Kinsey Millhone series. To date there are a total of twenty-three writings, each of which begins with a letter of the alphabet.
These novels are quite short and can be read quite quickly. “B is for Burglar” is three hundred and ten pages in paperback format.
Since entering the mystery writing field in 1982, Sue Grafton has created a series of novels, short stories, and television movies. She is a New York Times bestselling author.