1st Impressions by Kate Calloway

[spindizzy]

Rookie PI Cassidy James is hired to find a murdered man's killer in a quiet Oregon lakeside resort -- but the town's sexist police sergeant doesn't care to have an uppity lesbian gumshoe on the case. He's keen to arrest the victim's beautiful niece, who has Cassidy head over heels in love -- and in danger.

Kate Calloway's First Impressions was one of the first mysteries I reviewed for The Lesbrary, and it read like a cross between a soft-boiled PI and a cozy mystery, but with more dead spouses in backstory.

Cassidy James is our heroine, a former teacher who moved out to Cedar Hills and trained as a private investigator after her lover, Diane, died of cancer. Her best friend brings her the case of Erica Trinidad, a beautiful woman whose uncle was murdered and mutilated, which may or may not be connected to things like a break-in at the school and a case of arson.

The full review can be read here.