Who's Kitten Who? — Cynthia Baxter

WHEN IT COMES TO MURDER, THIS SLEUTH ISN'T PUSSYFOOTIN' AROUND

Veterinarian and amateur sleuth Jessica Popper takes center stage in the cast of an up-and-coming Long Island playwright's last production--and the fur flies as Jess finds the theater world littered with clues to Simon Wainwright's murder. Was the killer the actress who's a real glamour-puss? Or her rival for Simon's affections, a disheveled costume designer who looks like something the cat dragged in? Or how about the fat-cat Broadway producers?

Jessie's no scaredy-cat when she's on the prowl, but she loses her cool when her future in-laws and their monstrous Maltese descend on the tiny cottage she shares with fiance Nick Burby, Lou the one-eyed Dalmatian, rambunctious Westie Max, and the rest of her menagerie. Between coping with the "Invasion of the Burbarians" and playing cat and mouse with a killer, Jess could use nine lives herself. But curiosity killed the cat--will that be Jessie's fate by the time the curtain falls?