Hex
A Ruby Murphy Mystery
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- $5.99
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- $5.99
Publisher Description
Having drifted through thirty-three years of life, Ruby Murphy has put down roots in a rootless place: Coney Island. A recovering alcoholic who is fanatical in her love for animals and her misanthropic friends, Ruby lives above a furniture store and works at the musty Coney Island Museum. One day, Ruby is on the subway heading into Manhattan when the train stalls between stations. An elegant blond woman with a scarred face strikes up a conversation, and a misunderstanding between the two women leads to an offer Ruby decides she can’t refuse. The woman needs her boyfriend followed, and she thinks Ruby is the woman to do it—and do it right.
Ruby’s life has been flat and painful lately. The Coney Island Museum isn’t doing much business, Ruby’s live-in boyfriend has moved out, and her best friend Oliver is battling cancer. Ruby agrees to follow the woman’s boyfriend, Frank, a man who works at Belmont Racetrack and seems to hang out in odd places with bad company. Ruby soon finds herself pushed headfirst into horse racing’s seamy underbelly. This is a dangerous world where nothing is as it appears, and people and horses seem to have limited life spans. When Ruby finds herself staring down the barrel of a loaded gun, she begins to have second thoughts.
Only now it’s far too late.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Ruby Murphy, 33-year-old animal lover and recovering alcoholic, makes a lovably quirky heroine in Estep's debut mystery. Bored with her job at the Coney Island Museum, Ruby agrees through a misunderstanding with "a willowy blonde woman" she meets on the subway to follow the woman's shady boyfriend. Soon Ruby is a hotwalker at Belmont Racetrack, indulging in her lifelong love of horses while tracking the slippery Frank, a horse groom and former trainer. When an obnoxious jockey infatuated with Frank dies suddenly, Ruby smells foul play and decides to investigate. Against the advice of her friends and neighbors, Ruby divides her time between the racetrack and yoga, classical piano lessons and buying organic ground turkey for her cats. What sets this book apart is its use of six narrators, including Ruby herself. At times confusing and annoying, this technique nonetheless adds texture and subtle shading. While Estep is no Dick Francis, she knows horses and aptly describes the folks who build their lives around them for better or worse. A charming mass of contradictions, Ruby is a female sleuth much like Sparkle Hayter's Robin Hudson, stomping around New York one step ahead of chaos. FYI:Estep is the author ofDiary of an Emotional Idiot (1997), a novel, andSoft Maniacs (1999), a short story collection.
