Viviana Valentine and the Ticking Clock

Set in 1950, with characters as diverse as the New York City setting, is Edwards’s latest featuring recently engaged private investigators Viviana Valentine and Tommy Fortuna (following Viviana Goes Up the River). The couple’s plans for a New Year’s Eve in Times Square take a dive when they witness a brutal murder. They vow to investigate, just in case the police and their sometime nemesis Detective Lawson are in over their heads. Three other cases emerge: a missing banker, an artifact held for ransom, and a longtime friend of Tommy’s who asks the pair to tail his fiancée. At the heart of these cases, there is also a tension between Viv and Tommy—their new role as a soon-to-be married couple changes their previous professional relationship. They will have to solve that case too. The novel’s sometimes heavy-handed use of late ’40s and early ’50s vocabulary can wear thin.