Synopsis

A Buddhist nun returns to her hometown and solves multiple murders while enduring her dysfunctional family.

Ivy Lutz leaves her life as a Buddhist nun in Sri Lanka and returns home to northern California when her elderly mother suffers a stroke. Her sheltered life is blasted apart by a series of murders, which she attempts to solve with the help of a smitten detective.

She understands why someone might want to kill her stepfather, who it turns out to be is a smuggler on the run, but what about her mother? Is Ivy’s unstable sister right that she was murdered, too? Ivy struggles to live by her Buddhist principles and employ her mindfulness skills, and discovers they both hinder and help in her search for the truth.

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Praise for Verlin Darrow

“I don’t know when I’ve enjoyed a murder mystery more. Between the insightful sarcasm, inside jokes, flat out madcap hilarity and keenly wicked observations, there’s literally something to laugh or chuckle about on every page. This is truly a clever, one of a kind book that really turns everything upside down and inside out.”-Donna Thompson, Amazon Review

“I loved every page of this and I know that you will too! I highly recommend this to lovers of mystery and suspense novels, or anyone who likes a good novel at all!”-Sally S., Bound 4 Escape

“Almost immediately when I started reading this, I knew that I was going to enjoy it but I didn’t know that by the end, it would end up being one of my favorite reads of the year, so far!
I loved the narration in this novel. Tom Dashiel’s character was so funny and easy to root for. I found myself really wanting him to unravel the mystery at the center of this novel and somehow manage to get out alive.”-Nora, Storeybook Reviews

“Murder For Liar,’ is a book that just feels new. It feels unlike any other book you’ve ever read. I truly enjoyed this novel and couldn’t put it down once I started reading it! This book was perfection!”-Bee, BookPleasures.com

Excerpt

Art Petrie stood once Holly sauntered out. “I’m not spending one extra minute on this damned stool,” he told me. “Any thoughts about the case now that you heard what I heard in here?”

I stood as well. Petrie was about six inches taller than me. In high school, I’d fantasized that six inches was the perfect differential for slow dancing.

“If I were you,” I answered, “I’d check out that bar and look into the suspicious car—I don’t buy the peeping tom deal. Maybe a neighbor saw the car or who was in it. I’d also check Dennis’ phone records, which you’re probably doing anyway.”

“We are. And I’m with you on the other stuff. Anything else I might’ve missed?”

“On the one hand, like Dee, I think the murder could be connected with Dennis’ past. Maybe something caught up to him. Maybe there was an obituary about Mom that helped the murderer find him even though he’d changed his name. I don’t know. But on the other hand, it seems like her dying right before he did is unlikely to be a coincidence. Have you found out much about his career as a smuggler?”

“Not so far. We’re waiting on the Dublin police to get back to us, and he covered his tracks well here. If Maria—the ex—hadn’t told us about his real business, I don’t think we’d know he was involved in anything. Sometimes you get lucky early in an investigation, sometimes it’s later.”

“Or sometimes not at all, I imagine.”

“Yeah, that’s true.”

“Maybe it depends on how you define luck,” I said. I didn’t actually believe in luck; in my world, everything that happened was due to other factors.

“Maybe. This one guy from Santa Cruz says I’m lucky because it’s my karma, but I don’t buy that—no offense. Still, some people are lucky, and some aren’t.”

“True.” I smiled. We were almost talking about spirituality. “I’d better get back to the girls before my niece shows everyone up by solving all your cases.”

Petrie laughed. “I wouldn’t put it past her.”

“I’m glad Mom wasn’t there,” Dee said in the car on the way home. She’d been too slow to grab the front seat this time.

“Yeah,” Holly echoed from the passenger seat. “It was great that you just sat there and listened while we got interviewed, Aunt Ivy. Mom can’t shut up. She’s always getting set off by every little thing.”

When I dropped off my nieces at their house, I headed to my mother’s neighborhood. I wanted to talk to her neighbors about the white car before the police did. I reasoned that if anyone had seen it, getting to hear about it firsthand before they told anyone else would be advantageous. I knew I might get in trouble, but I also knew I could get out of it. Both Rick Foster and Art Petrie liked and trusted me, at least so far.

I picked a direction based on where Mom’s living room picture window faced, and drove three houses down the street, parking in front of a peculiar, burgundy home straight out of an architecture magazine. It looked as if the two-story steel structure might tip over any minute as half of it was cantilevered over a wading pool. The other half slanted up and away to a severely peaked roofline.

I closed my eyes and meditated in the driver’s seat to center myself. Recent events, including my encounter with Detective Petrie, had pulled me away from who I wanted to be in the world. The contrast between Ivy at the sangha and the woman playing detective in the Jaguar was discouraging.

I must’ve lost track of the time because I was startled back to full consciousness by a rapping on my window.

“Open up!” a shrill woman’s voice demanded.

A slim Caucasian in her forties sporting a spiral perm and a red sundress glared at me. I fumbled to find the button on the Jaguar that rolled down the window.

“Yes?” I ventured. I was only slowly coming back on line.

“This isn’t a parking lot. I’m sick and tired of chasing off you people. Why do I want to look out my window and see Feds littering my view?”

The woman’s face was pinched, as if her baseline setting was anxiety. Her intense brown eyes reminded me of my bi-polar sister’s.

“Feds?” I asked.

“FBI, if you like. And don’t bullshit me. I know who you are.” She stepped up close to the car window, intentionally invading my personal space.

“My mother and my stepfather just died three doors down,” I told her softly. “I’m not an FBI agent.”

“Oh, God. I’m so sorry. I just assumed.”

“Can I get out of the car? Can we talk?”

“Sure, sure.”

©Verlin Darrow guest post

Guest Review by Nora

“Yes, actually. When you believe in reincarnation, you believe we’re just moving from on state to another when we drop our bodies. I may not meet my mother when her essential self comes back in a new body, but I know she has more karmic business to work out, so I know she’s not done.”

An entirely unexpected novel about a sleuth who starts out as a Buddhist nun, ‘The Not Quite Enlightened Sleuth,’ is a romp of a very unexpected variety. I had no idea what a wild ride this story would be when I started it, but I knew from the very first chapter that I was going to have a great time reading. Ivy’s character is so interesting to me! As a Buddhist nun who recently left her post, she still holds all of the beliefs of her religion.

In the beginning of the story, the reasons behind Ivy’s leaving of her post are murky, but they become clear as the book progresses in a way that left me with little doubt as to her character’s motivations. Ivy’s main motivation in the book, of course, is the investigation into the murder of her mother, Lois.

For all intents and purposes (and according to both the hospital and the San Francisco police department) Lois had a series of strokes that ended her life. But Ivy isn’t so sure that is true.

With the help of a police officer friend, Ivy begins her sleuthing career by investigating a case that some would argue she is way too close to be objective about—the death of her mother. But, of course, sometimes the closest person is the best person for the job.

Things begin to come out about Ivy’s mother that even she could never have seen coming, and the solution to the murder, when it is revealed, definitely took me by surprise!

About the Author

Award-winning novelist, Verlin Darrow is currently a psychotherapist who lives with his psychotherapist wife in the woods near Monterey Bay in northern California. They diagnose each other as necessary.

He is the author of Blood and Wisdom, Coattail Karma, Prodigy Quest, and Murder For Liar. Two of these won major book awards. Verlin is a former professional volleyball player, country-western singer/songwriter, import store owner, and assistant guru in a small, benign cult.

Before bowing to the need for higher education, a much younger Verlin ran a punch press in a sheet-metal factory, drove a taxi, worked as a night janitor, shoveled asphalt on a road crew, and installed wood floors. He barely missed being blown up by Mt. St. Helens, survived the 1985 Mexico City earthquake (8.0), and (so far) he’s successfully weathered his own internal disasters.

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Giveaway

This giveaway is for 3 print or ebook copies.

Print is open to the U.S. only and ebook is open worldwide.

This giveaway ends on May 31, 2024 midnight, pacific time.

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