SWEET AND DEADLY

In the tiny southern town of Lowfield, Catherine Linton is recovering from the recent death of her parents in a car crash—the foul-play work of some unknown culprit. Furthermore, Catherine's quiet life—she works for the local paper, renting her doctor-father's old offices to fellow reporter Torn Mascalco—is shattered when she finds the bludgeoned body of Leona Gaites, her father's longtime nurse (a lady with sidelines in abortion and blackmail). Indeed, as Cathy soon discovers, there are lots of guilty secrets in Lowfield. . . which lead to yet another murder. But not until she answers a summons from the Linton family's retired maid does Catherine finally put it all together (with a newspaper-story connection) and finger the villain. Tidy, if not watertight, plotting; a convincing motive; an appealingly three-dimensional romance between Catherine and her editor. It all adds up to a nice, quiet debut—nothing special, but unpretentiously agreeable.