Category Archives: Humor

by | March 5, 2009 · 9:44 am

Kathryn Lilley. Dying to Be Thin. New York: Signet, 2007.

After being laid off from her Boston-based TV producer job, Kate Gallagher dreams of becoming an on-air investigative reporter. To do so she needs to lose some weight, so she uses her severance pay as a down-payment for a 12-week weight-loss program at the Hoffman Clinic in Durham. She also agrees to produce a story about her transformation for the local news to pay for the balance. Within 24 hours of arriving in the “Diet Capital of the World,” Kate finds the dead body of the clinic’s founder and she starts using her investigative skills to find the killer. This is the first book in Kathryn Lilley’s Fat City mystery series.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

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Filed under 2000-2009, 2007, Durham, Humor, Lilley, Kathryn, Mystery, Novels in Series, Piedmont

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by | February 23, 2009 · 9:47 am

Ann B. Ross. Miss Julia Throws a Wedding. New York: Viking, 2002.

When Hazel Marie decides to move out of Miss Julia’s house–and in with her boyfriend, J.D.–the proper widow isn’t sure what to do. Luckily, there are people in town who are more in the marrying mood and Julia throws herself into planning a proper wedding for a local couple. But nothing is ever easy in Abbotsville; there are bridal wedding jitters, uninvited guests, and a local thief for Julia to contend with. This is the third novel about Miss Julia’s exploits in the fictional town of Abbotsville.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library Catalog.

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Filed under 2000-2009, 2002, Henderson, Humor, Mountains, Novels in Series, Novels Set in Fictional Places, Ross, Ann B.

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by | February 5, 2009 · 9:34 am

Katy Munger. Out of Time. New York: Avon Books, 1998.

In the second book of the Casey Jones series, it is Casey’s client who is running out of time. Gail Honeycutt is on death row for killing her husband, her appeals are pretty much exhausted, and she only has a month before her execution, but she continues to declare her innocence. Unfortunately, Gail’s husband was a cop (maybe a dirty one) and Casey’s investigation into his death puts her on the wrong side of the local P.D., including her non-boyfriend Bill. Fingers are pointed at Casey when people connected to the case start dying and the donut-loving private detective has to find the killer before she is framed for his work.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC Library Catalog.

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Filed under 1990-1999, 1998, Durham, Humor, Munger, Katy, Mystery, Novels in Series, Orange, Piedmont, Wake

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by | February 4, 2009 · 2:16 pm

Ann B. Ross. Miss Julia Takes Over. New York: Viking, 2001.

At the opening of Miss Julia Takes Over, Hazel Marie Puckett disappears after a dinner-date in Asheville with Abbotsville’s new fundraiser. Although Hazel Marie was the mistress of Julia’s now-deceased husband, she and her son Lloyd are now part of Julia’s family and the upstanding widow is determined to find her. Since the police won’t help, Julia enlists the assistance of a beer-drinking, womanizing private eye. Her search brings her all around North Carolina and has her meeting a NASCAR driver outside Rockingham, whose missing property is connected to Hazel Marie’s disappearance. Readers of the first novel in the Miss Julia series will be familiar with the cast of supporting characters, including Miss Lillian, Sam Murdoch, Pastor Ledbetter, and televangelist Brother Vernon Puckett.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC Library Catalog.

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Filed under 2000-2009, 2001, Henderson, Humor, Mountains, Novels in Series, Novels Set in Fictional Places, Ross, Ann B.

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by | January 23, 2009 · 10:23 am

Ann B. Ross. Miss Julia Speaks Her Mind. New York: William Morrow, 1999.

The very proper Julia Springer doesn’t believe in speaking ill of the dead, but her husband’s sudden demise leaves her in a difficult position. She finds out that her stingy husband of more than forty years was actually quite rich and, since there is no will, she inherits every penny of his money. However, her unexpected windfall brings out the worst in some of her small-town neighbors, including a pastor who tries to get the money by proving her legally incompetent. The widow also inherits something else unexpected: her husband’s illegitimate nine-year-old son. As if this weren’t enough to keep Julia busy, she also faces a strange televangelist, a robbery, and a kidnapping.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library Catalog.

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Filed under 1990-1999, 1999, Henderson, Humor, Mountains, Novels in Series, Novels Set in Fictional Places, Ross, Ann B.

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by | November 6, 2008 · 11:21 am

T. Lynn Ocean. Southern Fatality. New York : St. Martin’s Minotaur, 2007.

At the opening of Southern Fatality, Jersey Barnes retires from the day-to-day business of her security firm to concentrate on her other Wilmington business, a pub called the Barter’s Block. She has plans for living a (more) quiet life and maybe even marrying her boyfriend, a model named Bill. When Bill asks her to use her security expertise to help an old friend catch her cheating husband, she reluctantly agrees and quickly finds herself caught up in a case that involves computer crimes, kidnapping, huge amounts of money, and murder. Along for the ride are Jersey’s business partner Ox, her dog Cracker, her pill-trading, poker-playing father, and a computer hacker named Soup.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

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Filed under 2000-2009, 2007, Coast, Humor, Mystery, New Hanover, Novels in Series, Ocean, T. Lynn, Romance/Relationship

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by | · 11:21 am

T. Lynn Ocean. Southern Poison. New York: St. Martin’s Minotaur, 2008.

Although she has been out of the anti-terrorist game for five years, the small print on Jersey Barnes’ government contract says that she can be recalled into service at any time. When her old handler shows up in her pub, she ends up working undercover. While looking for suspicious activity at an ammunition port outside Wilmington, Jersey uncovers one terrorist plot. But the obvious target isn’t the only one, and she stumbles upon a different scheme that hits much closer to home. In the meantime, she just begins exploring the possibility of a romance with Ox, her sexy friend and business partner, when his daughter and ex-wife arrive in town. This is the second of the Jersey Barnes mysteries and among the returning characters are computer-hacker Soup; Jersey’s dad, Spud; and her white lab, Cracker.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library catalog.

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Filed under 2000-2009, 2008, Coast, Humor, Mystery, New Hanover, Novels in Series, Ocean, T. Lynn, Romance/Relationship, Suspense/Thriller

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by | August 28, 2008 · 4:10 pm

Ann B. Ross. Miss Julia Paints the Town. New York: Viking, 2008.

What’s up with the men in Abbotsville??!! Mildred Allen’s husband has disappeared, Richard Stroud might have had his hand in the till, Pastor Ledbetter is toying with the idea of accepting a call to another church, and even Julia’s reliable Sam is acting suspiciously. And as if that isn’t enough, a developer wants to tear down the historic courthouse and redevelop the courthouse square. Miss Julia has a plan to scare off the developer, but it’s anything but a quiet spring in Abbotsville.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC-Chapel Hill Library Catalog.

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Filed under 2000-2009, 2008, Henderson, Humor, Mountains, Novels in Series, Novels Set in Fictional Places, Ross, Ann B.

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by | August 1, 2008 · 9:20 am

Ann B. Ross. Miss Julia’s School of Beauty. New York: Viking, 2005.

Miss Julia has always been the model of propriety, but she recently threw caution to the the wind and eloped, marrying Sam Murdoch at an all-night wedding chapel in Pigeon Forge, TN. Upon their return home, she has some difficulties settling into newly-married life, but these difficulties are pushed aside when she learns that her marriage might not be legal. Amidst worrying about whether or not she is living in sin (and how to keep anyone else from finding out), Julia agrees to teach etiquette to Miss S.W.A.T., Miss Detective Squad, and the rest of the Miss Abbot County Sheriff’s Department beauty pageant contestants. Miss Julia’s School of Beauty is the sixth book in the series of novels that focus on Miss Julia and her adventures in the fictional town of Abbotsville.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC Library Catalog.

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Filed under 2000-2009, 2005, Henderson, Humor, Mountains, Mystery, Novels in Series, Novels Set in Fictional Places, Ross, Ann B.

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by | April 15, 2008 · 11:13 am

Jane Tesh. A Case of Imagination. Scottsdale, AZ: Poisoned Pen Press, 2006.

Madeline Maclin is the former Miss Parkland in the fictional Piedmont town of Parkland, N.C. She has just opened a detective agency and is having a hard time getting people to take her seriously. That changes quickly when a friend and potential love interest inherits a house in nearby (and also fictional) Celosia where Maclin gets mixed up in a local beauty pageant and is soon involved in her first murder investigation.

This is the first novel in Tesh’s Maclin Investigations series.

Check this title’s availability in the UNC Library Catalog.

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Filed under 2000-2009, 2006, Humor, Mystery, Novels in Series, Novels Set in Fictional Places, Piedmont, Tesh, Jane

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