Deadly Spirits

July 15, 2022
A talented investigator and a medium who occasionally hits the mark are involved in yet another murder case. It's 1924, and life hasn't been easy for Maddie Pastore. Fleeing an abusive family, she met and married Tommy Pastore, whose job driving a truck for the Chicago mob got him killed, leaving her and baby Tommy penniless. A chance meeting with the mother of a school friend who makes a living as medium Madame Carlotta Romany gives Maddie a new lease on life. When she runs into singer Sophie Dale, she recognizes her as the sister she hasn't seen for many years. A few days later, Sophie's husband, Sebastian Dale, calls to tell Maddie that Sophie's been arrested for murder. Maddie's friendship with Det. O'Rourke gets her in to see Sophie, who claims that during a big party where she was singing for wealthy Nick Bardo, she felt unwell and passed out in a bedroom, where she was later found holding a bloody candlestick with Bardo's body on the floor. Sophie remembers nothing, and although Maddie is sure she's innocent, she knows it won't be easy to prove it. Maddie's prodigious skills at digging up facts encourage her to investigate Bardo's feuding family and his ties to the mob. She gets a hand from well-known police detective Alice Clement, who has a special interest in helping women. But Maddie has to keep Alice from learning that she works for a medium and fend off rival mobs' efforts to get her to set up Al Capone for a hit. Walking a dangerous path, she still manages to uncover the truth. Plenty of Roaring '20s ambience and enough red herrings to keep things mysterious.

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April 1, 2022

Following two LJ-starred reviews, The Mystic's Accomplice and Spirits and Smoke, this third in a series set in Prohibition-wracked, gang-ridden Chicago again features young widow Maddie Pastore. Here, Maddie contemplates a terrible thought: her younger sister might be a killer.

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July 18, 2022
Set in 1924 Chicago, Miley’s gripping third Mystic’s Accomplice mystery (after Spirits and Smoke) finds young widow Maddie Pastore, who lost her husband, a driver for Al Capone, to a hail of bullets two years earlier, continuing to make ends meet for herself and her toddler son by working as a shill for Madame Carlotta, a good-hearted “mystic” who offers comfort to the bereaved by connecting them by séance to the great beyond. It’s a living, but not a terribly lucrative one, so Maddie is thrilled to receive two free tickets to hear a singer at a local speakeasy. Much to her amazement, she recognizes the singer as her own younger sister, Sophie, whom she hasn’t seen in years. But three days later, Sophie is arrested for a murder she doesn’t remember committing. Determined not to lose her sister so soon after finding her again, Maddie approaches Chicago’s real-life lady detective Alice Clement to help her prove Sophie’s innocence. Besides smoothly blending fact and fiction, Miley delivers clever plot twists, including one involving a scheme by a rival mob boss of Capone’s, Hymie Weiss, to carry out a hit at a séance. Readers will hope to see a lot more of the resourceful Maddie.