The Man Who Loved Women to Death

A serial killer is showing Hoagy his novel in progress--and every chapter is murder....

Once Stewart "Hoagy" Hoag was the toast of the publishing world and the husband of luscious Broadway beauty Merilee Nash. Now, reunited with Merilee in proud parenthood, Hoagy ghosts celebrity memoirs to pay the rent. And solves the occasional murder, aided by Lulu, his anchovy-eating basset hound.

A ghostwriter usually chooses his clients, but this time Hoagy finds himself chosen. His new client calls himself the Answer Man, and he's mailing Hoagy anonymous installments of his work in progress. Each one narrates the stalking and strangling of a lovely young woman--and it's no sooner in Hoagy's mailbox than the cops find her branded with orange-lipstick question marks. Hoagy's deadly pen pal--bent on a megabestseller and a movie deal--is seeking his literary advice, and Hoagy's being tagged by both the police and the press as a twisted killer's go-between.

Hoagy has some questions of his own for the elusive Answer Man. But the closer he gets to the truth, the less he likes what he finds. For Hoagy fears the prolific killer may be someone too close to him for comfort. And that the next chapter of the Answer Man's grisly opus might be Hoagy's last.

From the Paperback edition.