Homicide in the House by Colleen J. Shogan
A Washington Whodunit Book 2
Kit Marshall has bounced back from her first brush with the law, when she was suspected of murdering her senator boss. Now she is working for a freshman congresswoman, Maeve Dixon, a young Gulf War veteran representing North Carolina. It’s February, and Kit is feeling out of sorts. A government shutdown has just been announced, wreaking havoc on the Hill, and Dan, Dixon’s chief of staff and Kit’s supervisor, is an inexperienced lightweight flying blind. Then there’s Kit’s distracted live-in boyfriend, Doug, who doesn’t seem any closer to popping the question. Kit’s best friend Meg is up to her eyeballs with her new beau and oversight committee job, and Clarence the beagle mix will certainly not win Capitol Canine if Meg has to campaign for him all by herself. Bad as things are now, they are about to get much worse.
Early one morning Representative Dixon is caught standing over the corpse of Jack Drysdale, the Speaker of the House’s top staffer, a man she argued with in front of the press the day before. The murder weapon was the Speaker’s gavel. This item was entrusted to Dixon at the time, leading the police to believe they’ve found their killer. To save her job, Kit must clear her boss’s name, and quickly. Dixon’s career may be over if the police declare her a suspect or an anonymous blogger known as Hill Rat breaks the story. Solving this murder will test Kit’s courage and all her fledgling powers of deduction as she roams a spooky, sparsely populated Capitol Hill looking for clues and sounding out suspects.
Absent the big commuter crowds to slow the boarding of trains, I arrived at Capitol South twenty-five minutes later. Maeve hadn’t replied. Perhaps the “trouble” had already blown over. Just in case she still needed help, I headed directly to the Cannon rotunda without stopping at the office. Reporters usually camped out inside the rotunda to shoot live cable television hits from Capitol Hill. It wasn’t as grandiose as the Capitol rotunda, but its Corinthian architecture with imposing columns did provide a stately backdrop for the camera.
I exited the elevator and walked past the famous Cannon Caucus Room, which hosted the House Un-American Committee hearings decades ago. Hearing Maeve’s voice in the distance, I followed the narrow hallway circling the rotunda. After rounding the bend, I found my boss. She wasn’t alone. Next to her was Detective O’Halloran of the Capitol Hill Police. Jack Drysdale was between them, but the Speaker’s top aide wasn’t looking so handsome this morning. Blood flowed from his head onto the pristine marble floor. If he’d generated Clarence’s Capitol Canine votes, there wouldn’t be any more favors coming my way. Jack Drysdale was dead.
My Thoughts
Homicide in the House by Colleen J. Shogan is the second book in her cozy political mystery series, the Washington Whodunit mysteries. I really liked the first book, Stabbing in the Senate. I was excited to have the chance to read this book and to get to hang out in Washington DC following Kit around as she solves the case. Even thought this book is the second in a series, I feel you could easily read it without reading the first book. Washington DC is one of my favorite places I’ve ever visited, and it is wonderful to read about it in this series.
Kit is a great cozy sleuth. The mystery is well-written and had enough twists and turns to keep me guessing. I highly recommend this to anyone who enjoys smart, fast-paced cozies (especially those with a non-traditional setting/theme). This is a series that I look forward to following.
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1,182 total views, 1 views today
Claudette Melanson - Author of Dark Fantasy
Looks like another great read! Sharing for you 🙂
Colleen Shogan
Thanks for the great review!
diannekc
Like the setting, there is so much to see in Washington DC. A perfect place for a mystery.
Dan Denman
I like the cover of the book. I think that I will like Kit. She sounds like a good character.