Dear Great Book Guru, Rain, rain go away… I am so upset - a huge favorite of mine, Hunt and Hughes - was rained out at the latest Sunset Serenade. I need a good book to read this week as I hope for sunny days ahead! Sunset Serenade Despite the Rain Fan................................................... Dear Sunset Serenade Despite the Rain Fan, I just read a debut mystery BLUNT INSTRUMENT by a favorite novelist of mine, Amy Bloom. Dee Chandler is a former English professor who has lost her teaching position because of “anger management” issues but has found a new profession: private investigator! Her qualifications are rather limited – basically, obsessive viewing of the TV series LAW AND ORDER. When she gets a call to investigate the murder of Oliver Bullfinch, a widely disliked English professor at a posh New England college, she quickly accepts and a madcap series of misadventures begins. We meet a wide array of exquisitely drawn characters, all of whom have ample reason to want Bullfinch dead. From the murder weapon – a bronze bust of Nathaniel Hawthorne - to a score of plagiarized dissertations - the world of academia is seen through a comedic, albeit violent lens. When the murderer is finally revealed, the reader realizes this has been both an exciting literary mystery and an amusing spoof on college politics. Recommended!