MALPRACTICE IN MAGGODY
by Joan Hess
The cure is definitely worse than the disease when shady doctors open a rehab clinic in rural Arkansas.
Most everyone in Maggody is itching like a hound dog with a tick to find out what’s going on at the old folks’ home. First they discharge all the patients, which means that Dahlia Buchanon has to take in her granny, who takes over the twins’ room and snores like a buzz saw, forcing husband Kevvie to sleep on the porch. Then a limousine drops off a guy with a Hollywood tan and sunglasses, and next thing you know, the place is surrounded by security guards who don’t even speak English. But motel owner Ruby Bee Hanks and her best friend Estelle Oppers are more interested in finding out about the stars rehabbing at the rechristened Stonebridge Foundation, even studying Spanish so they can interrogate the maids whom owner Vincent Stonebridge has put up in two of the Flamingo’s four units. Ruby Bee thinks she’s hit the jackpot when Sheriff Harve Dorfer sends her daughter, Police Chief Arly Hanks (Muletrain to Maggody, 2004, etc.), to investigate the murder of the facility’s receptionist, Molly Foss. But when psychiatrist Randall Zumi is found dead in his office, Arly realizes that her interrupted weekend with her boyfriend Jack Wallace may just be the least of her worries.
Zany as ever, Hess’s latest is a sure cure for whatever ails you.