RITA MAE BROWN

Mrs Murphys fourth caper will be lapped up like half-and-half by the faithful.Kirkus Reviews The best yet.Publishers Weekly The residents of tiny Crozet, Virginia, thrive on gossip, especially in the post office, where Mary Minor Harry Haristeen presides with her tiger cat, Mrs. Murphy. So when a belligerent Hells Angel crashes Crozet demanding to see his girlfriend, the leather-clad interloper quickly becomes the chief topic of conversation. Then the biker is found murdered, and everyone is baffled. Well, almost everyone . . . Mrs. Murphy and her friends, Welsh corgi Tee Tucker and overweight feline Pewter, havent been slinking through alleys for nothing. But can they dig up the truth in time to save their humans from a ruthless killer? If you must work with a collaborator, you want it to be someone with intelligence, wit, and an infinite capacity for subtletysomeone, in fact, very much like a cat. . . . Its always a pleasure to visit this cozy world.The New York Times Book Review

At thirty-five, Mary Frazier Armstrong, called "Frazier" by friends and enemies alike, is a sophisticated woman with a thriving art gallery, a healthy bank balance, and an enviable social position. In fact, she has everything to live for, but shes lying in a hospital bed with a morphine drip in her arm and a life expectancy measured in hours. "Dont die a stranger," her assistant says on her last hospital visit. "Tell the people you love who you are." And so, as her last act on earth, Frazier writes letters to her closest family and friends, telling them exactly what she thinks of them and, since she will be dead by the time they receive the letters, the truth about herself: shes gay.The letters are sent. Then the manure hits the fan in Charlottesville, Virginia, because the funny thing is, Frazier Armstrong isnt going to die after all.

She had the presidents ear and the nations heart. Shes the wife of the fourth president of the United States; a spirited charmer who adores parties, the latest French fashions, and the tender, brilliant man who is her husband. But while many love her, few suspect how complex Dolley Madison really is. Only in the pages of her diaryas imagined by novelist Rita Mae Browncan Dolley fully reveal herself. And there we discover the real first ladyimpulsive, courageous, and wiseas she faces her harshest trial: in 1814, the United States is once more at war with mighty Britain, and her beloved James is the most hated man in America. From the White House receptions she gaily presides over to her wild escape from a Washington under siege, Dolley gives us a legend, made warmly human. For there has never been a first lady so testedor one who came through the fire so brilliantly.