The Mummy's Ransom: A Ransom/Charters Mystery

Louie Dolores strides over Chicago like the skyscrapers he builds. While he has built a formidable array of enemies by his law-skirting tactics and his lack of regard for the architectural history of his city, he has also built a fortune--some of he is using to bring in a set of ancient mummies from Chili which he plans to show in one of his own buildings. The protests outside don't bother Dolores--he'll use them for publicity. When the mummies inside seem to be coming to life, Dolores is quick to bring that to the newspapers as well. But is he too smart for his own good? When Dolores ends up murdered, a two-thousand-year-old mummy is the only suspect. Police Detective Jeremy Ransom, along with his friend the elderly Miss Emily Charters is called to look into death threats against Dolores--threats that become horribly real. The two sleuths find that Dolores hadn't just made enemies, a whole range of people hated him and wanted him dead. Yet hatred isn't enough. Someone had to actually kill--and neither believe that one of the museum mummies really came back to life. Author Fred Hunter uses a light touch to deal with a deadly subject. Hunter does a fine job depicting the destruction associated with murder--ruins of marriages, careers, and even sanity that extend far beyond the victim and perp. I felt a little cheated by the end of the novel--which came too quickly to deliver the full impact of the solution but otherwise found THE MUMMY'S RANSOM to be quite enjoyable

The Chicago Dolores Towers sponsors the first American showing of pre-BC Chilean Chichorro mummies. The exhibits brings protests from native Chileans who were already upset that archeologists dug the grave sites of their ancestors, but find this sideshow to be as deep an outrage. Sponsor Louis Dolores feels the publicity of his support to a historical exhibit will help him with his latest plan to raze a historical site. Police detective Jeremy Ransom feels confident nothing will go wrong at the exhibit because his friend, senior citizen Emily Charters, a magnet for homicides, is not attending the gala opening. However, he is sent to look into death threats and a breech of security that Louis would prefer to ignore. However, Louis should never have disregarded the threat because someone kills him. Jeremy investigates a wide range of suspects that include a sighted mummy running loose at night, an angry personal assistant, the Chilean protesters, and the Chilean museum curator with doubts about the exhibit- among other suspects. THE MUMMY'S RANSOM is an exciting police procedural that leaves the reader guessing whether it is a supernatural murderer or a more earthly killer. The story line succeeds because the cast feels real and Fred Hunter insures the audience understands the motives of the key secondary characters. Fans of the series will relish the return of Jeremy and his "extended family" in this engaging who-done-it.Harriet Klausner