A Cat On Stage Left : Alice Nestleton Mysteries #16

Alice Nestleton Mystery #16

by Lydia Adamson, Anna Fields (Narrator)

When a wealthy woman offers actress-turned-sleuth Alice Nestleton $2,500 to watch over her precious cat, it's an offer she can't refuse. The woman arrives only to be shot by her chauffeur on Alice's doorstep. When Alice opens the cat carrier to check on the now orphaned feline, all she finds is a toy cat on wheels. The police believe that Alice is hiding the identity of a third person inside the killer's car but she truly did not see the person. Teaming up with the dead woman's hard-bitten elderly neighbor and a few friends, Alice delves into the victim's past and finds that it eerily intersects with her own. Still, she can't understand why anyone would pay so much money for a toy cat.

"Adamson keeps her series fresh with new insights into Alice...and the addition of Sam, a hard boiled fluffy character." (amazon.com)

Genres: Mystery, Cats, Fiction, Cozy Mystery, Animals

Audio Cassette

First published January 1, 1998

About the author

Lydia Adamson is the pen name for Franklin B. King who is an author, free-lance writer and copywriter. In addition to the Alice Nestleton series, he is the author of the Deirdre Quinn Nightingale and Lucy Wayles series. He lives in New York City and also wrote under the name 'Frank King'.

Reviews

[Jenn · Rating 2 out of 5]

Why do I keep reading these? This is the third one and each one just keeps getting worse and worse. I don’t like Alice Nestleton. I like her cats but they don’t play into this tale very much. I don’t like her actor friends. And I found the whole murder implausible. I pick these up because they are supposed to be quick reads. But this book with less than 200 pages took me 6 days. 6 DAYS!! I vow to not purchase another and stop fooling myself by saying they’re short and will up my read count.

[Helen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Found this in a church book sale and liked the cat on the cover. A very quick read but the characters come out clearly and the descriptions make this part of Manhattan come alive: the little cafes, the dark bars and the loft apartments. the characters are a little bizarre, Alice over reacts and her boyfriend certainly creates a very casual relationship, but the waitress who was in a class Alice taught and has things she wants to say about Alice's portrayal of the theatre world is really good.
I'll definitely keep my eye out for others in this series when I want a quick fun read.

[Roberta · Rating 1 out of 5]

I don't know, maybe the nervy NYCity thing and the characters yelling at each other or lying to each other made it unpleasant. I didn't care for the main character, and that counts for a lot.

[Nancy · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is a very silly book.

[Karen GoatKeeper · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mary Singer calls Alice wanting her to cat sit her cat Dante and will pay very well for the service. When Alice goes out on the sidewalk to meet her, a large Bentley drives up. The door opens. A woman is shoved out along with a cat carrier. The chauffeur shoots the woman, gets back in the car and drives away.
On the evening news the entire scene is broadcast thanks to a tourist's video. Except the tourist is a local actor from years ago.
The cat in the carrier is a stuffed cat on roller skates. The cat sitting fee is taped to its stomach.
Alice is badgered by the police. She is sought out by an old writer of detective novels. The two set out to solve this murder no matter where the trail leads or how dangerous it gets.
This book takes Alice through her usual quirky ideas as she slowly zeroes in on the truth. The main clue sits in front of Alice and the reader all the time, but is overlooked. It is a fun, fast book to read.

[Joan · Rating 4 out of 5]

A delightful read. I enjoyed it.

[Kathei]

If you like cats and you like mysteries then this series is for you.

[Elizabeth]

Quit series here

[Jamie · Rating 1 out of 5]

I picked this book up mostly because it was thin and entirely because it was a mystery story with a cat-sitter lead character. I’m very much a cat person.

There wasn’t much about cats in the story (Alice owns some, her boyfriend owns some, the dead woman owned a Bengal which was lovely but could have been written out of the story entirely if not for needing an excuse to see a cat-sitter, and there’s a stuffed cat toy) and the ones that are there are no more than props. But the mystery, ye gads the mystery. They make it pretty clear nearly right at the get go that the murder had something to do with a weight loss program, but it’s easy to lose sight of that under the overwhelming cheese. You could eat this plot with nachos. The whole thing was a mediocre love story to film noir detective stories, with a sexist PI who talks like... Christie, what does he even talk like? Nobody talks like that in real life. The pages bleed with bad New Jersey accent every time Sam Tully has dialogue.

The thing I genuinely can’t understand about this book - just baffles the hell out of me - is that it’s the 16th in the series. The 16th. I read it convinced it was the 2nd. You could have knocked me over with a feather when I popped by Goodreads for some background. Alice can’t understand why anyone would assume she solved crimes, there was only one previous plot referenced and Alice had to look up the news article to familiarize herself with why the woman may have thought she was a PI, her friends are very doubtful she can or should try to figure out what’s going on herself, and at the end of the book she has solidified a ‘mystery team’ with her two friends and the cheesy mystery writer. If it wasn’t for the previous plot being mentioned I would have even said this was the first book. But 16th? What the hell was going on in the last 15? Actual cat-sitting?


THE VERDICT? You can probably see where I’m going with this, but I don’t recommend this book. Not because of the cheesy film noir style, because some people probably like that, particularly since this is the 16th in the series, but because it’s not well written which is often more indicative of such a late-in-the-series book. There’s a great deal of introspection, which I know is often seen in the old detective story style, but these moments are short, irrelevant, and do nothing but act as set ups for lame puns. Also, not only Sam Tully talks unrealistically. One thing you’ll notice about the two friends is that a lot of their dialogue is pure, flat exposition. At some points it sounds like they’re reading off an advertisement. So this one’s a no-go for cozy and noir lovers both.

[Sandra Strange · Rating 3 out of 5]

This series provide quick, entertaining, easy reads. The protagonist is Alice Nestleton, a New York City actress of great skill, but who never gets the starmaking break so moves along the fringes of the drama world and knows EVERYONE. Her day job keeps her going--she's a cat sitter, and therein lies the tale--and many tales-- of the murders in which she continually finds herself involved. She investigates using her associates and her niece to interview and research the mysteries. Part of the attraction of these is that she's almost always mostly wrong in her conclusions, but they help her extract truth and get to the right solutions in the end. However, Alice shares the morals and mores of stereotypical New York drama personnel. The books almost always include sensual scenes as she shares her bed with some continuing and some characters exclusive to each novel.

[Phillis · Rating 4 out of 5]

As far as the Alice Nestleton's go this is just as good as the others I have read. I have to keep remembering that the author Lydia Adamson is a pseudonym. The author is a male and he really doesn’t understand female feelings and responses to certain situations and sometimes what he writes is pretty funny. Not the ha-ha the story line is funny, more like ha-ha I can’t believe he wrote that! Basically he writes an entertaining easy to read put down and pick up without missing the story line progression books. Something I use to fill in while reading other books.

[CynthiaA · Rating 3 out of 5]

I inherited a box of books from a friend, most of which are not my preferred reading style. A stack of "Cat" books was in the box, and I had a terrible cold and could barely concentrate so I read one while in bed one night. And honestly, it wasn't half bad. Yes, predictable in some ways, the way I find many mystery series are. But entertaining enough. In a sitcom kind of way. I can see why there are lots of books in this series. I can see why people like them.

[Monty · Rating 3 out of 5]

Here is yet another light-hearted murder mystery that serves as a change of pace read. I'll continue to read more in the Alice Nestleton series

[Cindy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a first by this author. I have researched the series and will read from the first.

[Michelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

An uninspiring mystery. I just couldn't care much about the characters and the solution was such that the reader never really had a chance to solve it.

[Alan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Solid detective story featuring cat-walker Alice Nestleton. Longer review here: http://eyesandearsblog.blogspot.com/2...

[Donna · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fun short book - I have 3 more of these to go.