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A Body to Die For    by Kate White Amazon.com order for
Body to Die For
by Kate White
Order:  USA  Can
Warner, 2003 (2003)
Hardcover, Audio, CD
* *   Reviewed by Hilary Williamson

In Bailey Weggins' second adventure (following If Looks Could Kill), she combines the sleuthing skills of Nancy Drew with an inaptitude for romantic attachment, as she takes us into a glamorous spa setting. Her love life has been nonexistent since psychology professor Jack disappeared to deal with urgent family problems and, at her mother's urging, Bailey has taken up the invitation of old family friend, Danielle (Danny) Hubner to enjoy 'an all-expenses paid' week-end at her inn/spa retreat.

Unfortunately, Bailey has only begun to enjoy the inn's ambience, when she discovers the obligatory body - one of the spa's masseuses wrapped in Mylar paper like 'some horrible mummy from outer space'. She's soon digging as fast as she can, in her usual irrepressible fashion, to help solve the crime and preserve Danny's business. Naturally, this does not make Bailey universally popular. She finds a link to a previous customer's death, illegal extras sold by the victim, and something fishy in the dead girl's past.

The intense chief investigator, 'dashing Detective Beck', complicates Bailey's romantic life at the same time as Jack appears, somewhat unsatisfactorily back on her radar. Threats, including a mummified mouse, do not deter this perky heroine, who continues to sample various spa therapies - massage with hot stones, sento baths, Shirodhara massage, and a sea mud wrap - in between meeting an article deadline and tracking down the murderer.

The author throws in several surprises to put us off the scent of a mystery that's as cozy and fluffy as the toasty 'thick Egyptian-cotton' towels supplied by the spa. Bailey is sheer fun!

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